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THE KREBS COLLECTION 

(LINGUISTICS) 



Warren Hastings. 



BY 



LORD MACAULAY. 



LEIPZIG 

GEESSNEK & SCHEAMM. 

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409416 
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INTEODUCTION. 



^*^HOMAS Babington Macatjlay was bom at RotMey 
Temple, in Leicestersliire, on the 25th of October, 
1800. His grandfather, the Rev. John Macaulay, 
minister of Oardross, had twelve children. One of 
them, Zachary, began life as overseer of an estate in 
Jamaica, saw the ills of slavery, and at the age of 
twenty-four went to Sierra Leone in the service of a 
company formed to oppose free labour to slave labour. 
After some years Zachary Macaulay settled in England 
as secretary to that company, and married a Quakeress, 
Selina Mills, who had been a pupil, and who remained 
a friend, of Hannah More and her sisters. 

Zachary's sister Jean had married Mr. Thomas 
Babington of Rothley Temple, in Leicestershire ; Mrs. 
Macaulay was staying with her friends at Rothley 
Temple when her first child was born; and so he was 
named Thomas Babington Macaulay. The child's ear- 
liest home was in Birchin Lane, at the house of the 
Sierra Leone Com^Dany; afterwards the family was 
established at a house in High Street, Clapham. From 
childhood Macaulay had a very wonderful memory. 
He read much, also wrote verses, and he " talked like 



iv rNTRODaOTlON. 

print." When four yeaivs old lie replied to a lady who 
condoled with him upon having hot coffee spilt over his 
legs, " Thank you, madam, the agony is abated." 

Macaulay was placed first at a school in Clapham, 
then with an Evangelical clergyman, who taught a 
dozen boys, at Little Shelford, near Cambridge. In 
October 1818, he was sent to Trinity College, Cam- 
bridge, where he twice gained the Chancellor's medal 
for English verse. He obtained also a prize offered to 
the Junior Bachelor of his College who should write 
the best essay on the " Conduct and Character of 
William the Third." Ho was brilliant among fellow 
students as a writer and a talker, and he never ceased 
to be a talker. In later days Samuel Rogers, at one of 
tlie breakfasts to which he gathered many men of 
letters, once announced that as Macaulay was coming 
presently, " If any one has anything to say let him say 
it now, while there remains a chance." 

In 1823 and 1824 Macaulay contributed to a maga- 
/Ane, Knight's Quarterly, set up by Cambridge students. 
Montcontour, Ivry, Songs of the Huguenots, were 
among his contributions. In 1824 he obtained a 
Fellowship of Trinity, and in August of the same year 
Francis Jeffrey, who was looking out for some young 
men who could put new blood into the Edinburgh 
Review, published with great satisfaction, Macaulay's 
first contribution to it, an article on Milton. This was 
a new departure in reviewing, for Macaulay's articles 
may be said to have established a change of fashion in 



I1>TTR0DUCTI0N, " V 

the form of writing for the quarterly reviews. His 
articles were not reviews, but independent essays, 
including a few Avords about some book which had 
been taken as a peg on which to hang short pieces of 
history or biography, written with little or no regard 
to the book supposed to be under review, as in the case 
of the present Essay, which is professedly a review of 
Mr. Gleig's " Life of Warren Hastings." Young 
Macaulay continued to write articles in the JEdlnburgh 
Review. These, with his fluent talk in society, talk en- 
riched from the stores of an unfathomable memory 
and brightened by his kindly nature, caused Lord 
Lyndhurst to regard him as the most promising of the 
young Whigs. Lord Lyndhurst made him, in 1828, a 
Commissioner of Bankruptcy. With this appoint- 
ment and about £300 a year from his fellowship, and 
£200 a year from his writing, Macaulay, at the age of 
twenty-eight, had an income of £900 a year. He felt 
strong enough to shape for himseK a great career; and 
at his own choice, either in literature or in politics. At 
that time he looked chiefly to political life, and was 
put into Parliament in 1830 by Lord Lausdowne for 
the pocket borough of Calne. Macaulay was full of 
home affection, helpful as son and brother, and in high 
spirits with the sense of sure success. "Yesterday 
Tom dined with us," a sister recorded one day in 
January, 1832 ; " Tom dined with us and stayed late. 
He talked almost uninterruptedly for six hours." 
After the passing of the E-eform Bill, Macaulay was 



VI • INTRODUCTION. 

appointed Secretary of tlie Board of Control, whicli 
represented tlie voice of the Crown in tlie affairs of 
the East India Company. In January, 1833, he en- 
tered Parliament as member for Leeds ; and in De- 
cember he obtained the appointment which confirmed 
the inclination of his mind towards Indian affairs. 
One seat of the Supreme Council of India was ap- 
pointed to be held by a nominee of the Crown who was 
not a servant of the Company. This was offered to 
Macaulay. The salary was ten thousand a year. He 
could save half of it, and return after some years to 
England with the independence necessary to political 
success. 

In 1834 Macaulay went to India with a sister 
Hannah, who there married Charles (afterwards Sir 
Charles) Trevelyan. In India Macaulay worked in- 
defatigably. He became President of the Committee 
of Public Instruction, and President of a Law Com- 
mission for which he framed a code of Indian Criminal 
Law. 

During the four years of his life in India Macaulay's 
unremitting work earned him enduring honour. He 
came back in 1838. His essay on Lord Clive appeared 
in the Edinhurgk Review in January, 1840 ; this on 
Hastings in October, 1841. Its date was the year be- 
fore the publication of the Lays of Ancient Borne, and 
six years before the withdrawal from political life that 
was followed by the writing of Macaulay's History. 

H. M. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 



Warren Hastings sprang from an ancient and illus- 
trious race. It has been affirmed that his pedigree can 
be traced back to the great Danish sea-king, whose 
sails were long the terror of both coasts of the British 
Channel, and who, after many fierce and doubtful 
struggles, yielded at last to the valour and genius of 
Alfred. But the undoubted splendour of the line of 
Hastings needs no illustration from fable. One branch 
of that line wore, in the fourteenth century, the coronet 
af Pembroke. From another branch sprang the re- 
nowned Chamberlain, the faithful adherent of the 
White Rose, whose fate has furnished so striking a 
theme both to poets and to historians. His family 
received from the Tudors the earldom of Huntingdon, 
which, after long dispossession, was regained in our 
time by a series of events scarcely paralleled in 
romance. 

The lords of the manor of Daylesf ord, in Worcester- 
shire, claimed to be considered as the heads of this 



8 WARREN HASTINGS. 

distinguished family. The main stock, indeed, pros- 
pered less than some of the younger shoots. But the 
Daylesford family, though not ennobled, was wealthy 
and highly considered, till, about two hundred years 
ago, it was overwhelmed by the great ruin of the civil 
war. The Hastings of that time was a zealous Cavalier, 
He raised money on his lands, sent his plate to the 
mint at Oxford, joined the royal army, and, after spend- 
ing half his property in the cause of King Charles, was 
glad to ransom himself by making over most of the 
remaining half to Speaker Lenthal. The old seat at 
Daylesford still remained in the family ; but it could 
no longer be kept up ; and in the following generation 
it was sold to a merchant of London. 

Before this transfer took place, the last Hastings of 
Daylesford had presented his second son to the rectory 
of the parish in which the ancient residence of the 
family stood. The living wanS of little value ; and the 
situation of the poor clergyman, after the sale of the 
estate, was deplorable. He was constantly engaged in 
lawsuits about his tithes with the new lord of the 
manor, and was at length utterly ruined. His eldest 
son, Howard, a well-conducted young man, obtained a 
place in the Customs. The second son, Pynaston, an 
idle worthless boy, married before he was sixteen, lost 
his wife in two years, and died in the West Indies, 
leaving to the care of his unfortunate father a little 



VVAKKEIV HASTINGS. 9 

orpliau, destined to strange and memorable vicissitudes 
of fortune. 

Warren, tlie son of Pynaston, was born on the 6tli of 
December, 1732. His mother died a few days later, 
and he was left dependent on his distressed grandfather. 
The child was early sent to the village school, where he 
learned his letters on the same bench with the sons of 
the peasantry; nor did anything in his garb or fare 
indicate that his life was to take a widely different 
course from that of the young rustics with whom he 
studied and played. But no cloud could overcast the 
dawn of so much genius and so much ambition. The 
very ploughmen observed, and long remembered, how 
kindly little Warren took to his book. The daily sight 
of the lauds which his ancestors had possessed, and 
which had passed into the hands of strangers, filled his 
young brain with wild fancies and projects. He loved 
to hear stories of the wealth and greatness of his 
progenitors, of their splendid housekeeping, their 
loyalty, and their valour. On one bright summci- 
day, the boy, then just seven years old, lay on the bank 
of the rivulet which flows through the old domain of 
his house to join the Isis. There, as threescore and ten 
years later he told the tale, rose in his mind a scheme 
which, through all the turns of his eventful career, was 
never abandoned. He would recover the estate which 
had belonged to his fathers. He would be Hastings of 



10 WAliKEN HASTINGS. 

Daylesford. This purpose, formed in infancy and 
poYerty, grew stronger as his intellect expanded and as 
his fortune rose. He pursued his plan with that calm 
but indomitable force of will which was the most 
striking peculiarity of his character. When, under a 
tropical sun, he ruled fifty millions of Asiatics, his 
hopes, amidst all the cares of war, finance, and legis- 
lation, still pointed to Daylesf ord. And when his long 
public life, so singularly chequered with good and evil, 
with glory and obloquy, had at length closed for ever, 
it was to Daylesf ord that he retired to die. 

When he was eight years old, his uncle Howard 
determined to take charge of him, and to give him a 
liberal education. The boy went up to London, and 
was sent to a school at N'ewington, where he was well 
taught but ill fed. He always attributed the smallness 
of his stature to the hard and scanty fare of this 
seminary. At ten he was removed to Westminster 
School, then flourishing under the care of Dr. Nichols. 
Vinny Bourne, as his pupils affectionately called him, 
was one of the masters. Churchill, Colman, Lloyd, 
Cumberland, Cowper, were among the students. With 
Cowper, Hastings formed a friendship which neither 
the lapse of time, nor a wide dissimilarity of opinions 
and pursuits, could wholly dissolve. It does not 
appear that they ever met after they had grown to 
manhood. But forty years later, when the voices of 



WARREN HASTINGS. 11 

many great orators were crying for vengeance on the 
oppressor of India, the sliy and secluded poet could 
imagine to himself Hastings the Governor -General 
only as the Hastings with whom he had rowed on the 
Thames and played in the cloister, and refused to 
believe that so good-tempered a fellow could have done 
anything very wrong. His own life had been spent in 
praying, musing, and rhyming among the water-lilies 
of the Ouse. He had preserved in no common measure 
the innocence of childhood. His spirit had indeed 
been severely tried, but not by temptations which 
impelled him to any gross violation of the rules of 
social morality. He had never been attacked by 
combinations of powerful and deadly enemies. He 
had never been compelled to make a choice between 
innocence and greatness, between crime and ruin. 
Firmly as he held in theory the doctrine of human 
depravity, hi^ habits were such that he was unable to 
conceive how far from the path of right even kind and 
noble natures may be hurried by the rage of conflict 
and the lust of dominion. 

Hastings had another associate at "Westminster of 
whom we shall have occasion to make frequent men- 
tion, Elijah Impey. We know little about their 
school-days. But we think we may safely venture to 
guess that, whenever Hastings wished to play any 
trick more than usually naughty, he hired Impey with 



12 WAnREN HASTlNOa. 

a tart or a ball to act as fag iu the worst part of the 
prank. 

Warren was distinguished among his comrades as 
an excellent swimmer, boatman, and scholar. At 
fourteen he was first in the examination for the 
foundation. His name in gilded letters on the walls 
of the dormitory still attests his victory over many 
older competitors. He stayed two years longer at the 
school, and was looking forward to a studentship at 
Christ Gliurch, when an event happened which changed 
the whole course of his life. Howard Hastings died, 
bequeathing his nephew to the care of a friend and 
distant relation, named Chiswick. This gentleman, 
though he did not absolutely refuse the charge, was 
desirous to rid himself of it as soon as possible. Dr. 
Nichols made strong remonstrances against the cruelty 
of interrupting the studies of a youth who seemed 
likely to be one of the first scholars of the age. He 
even offered to bear the expense of sending his favourite 
pupil to Oxford. But Mr. Chiswick was inflexible. 
He thought the years which had already been wasted 
on hexameters and pentameters quite sufficient. He 
had it in his power to obtain for the lad a writership 
in the service of the East India Company. Whether 
the young adventurer, when once shipped off, made a 
fortune, or died of a liver complaint, he equally ceased 
to be a burden to anybody. Warren was accordingly 



WATlItEN HA>VrtNGS. 13 

romovofl frnrn WpstniiiiKter Soliool, anrl plaood for a 
few niontlis at a commercial academy, to study arith- 
metic and book-kep])ing. In Janiiary, 1750, a few 
days after he had completed his seventeenth year, he 
sailed for Bengal, and arrived at his destination in the 
October following. 

He was immediately placed at a desk in the Secre- 
tary's office at Calcutta, and laboured there during two 
years. Fort William was then purely a commercial 
settlement. In the south of India the encroaching 
policy of Dupleix had transformed the servants of the 
English Company, against their will, into diplomatists 
and generals. The war of the succession was raging 
in the Carnatic ; and the tide had been suddenly turned 
against the French by the genius of young Robert 
Clive. But in Bengal the European settlers, at peace 
with the natives and with each other, were wholly 
occupied with ledgers and bills of lading. 

After two years passed in keeping accounts at 
Calcutta, Hastings was sent up the country to Cossim- 
bazar, a town which lies on the Hoogley, about a mile 
from Moorshedabad, and which then bore to Moorshe- 
dabad a relation, if we may compare small things with 
great, such as the city of London bears to Westmin- 
ster. Moorshedabad was the abode of the prince who, 
by an authority ostensibly derived from the Mogul, but 
really independent, ruled the three great provinces qf 



14 WAEHEN HASTINGS. 

Bengal, Orissa, and Baliar. At Moorsliedabad were 
the court, the harem, and the public offices. Cossim- 
bazar was a port and a place of trade, renowned for the 
quantity and excellence of the silks which were sold 
in its marts, and constantly receiving and sending 
forth fleets of richly laden barges. At this important 
point the Company had established a small factory 
subordinate to that of Fort William. Here, during 
several years, Hastings was employed in making 
bargains for stuffs with native brokers. While he 
was thus engaged, Surajah Dowlah succeeded to the 
government, and declared war against the English. 
The defenceless settlement of Cossimbazar, lying close 
to the tyrant's capital, was instantly seized. Hastings 
was sent a prisoner to Moorshedabad, but, in conse- 
quence of the humane intervention of the servants of 
the Dutch Company, was treated with indulgence. 
Meanwhile the Nabob marched on Calcutta; the 
governor and the commandant fled; the town and 
citadel were taken, and most of the English prisoners 
perished in the Black Hole. 

In these events originated the greatness of 
Warren Hastings. The fugitive governor and his 
companions had taken refuge on the dreary islet 
of Fulda, near the mouth of the Hoogley. They 
were naturally desirous to obtain full information re- 
specting the proceedings of the Kabob ; and no person 



A^ARREN HASTINGS. 15 

seemed so likely to furnish it as Hastings, who was a 
prisoner at large in the immediate neighbourhood of 
the court. He thus became a diplomatic agent, and 
soon established a high character for ability and reso- 
lution. The treason which at a later period was fatal 
to Surajah Dowlah was already in progress; and 
Hastings was admitted to the deliberations of the 
conspirators. But the time for striking had not 
arrived. It was necessary to postpone the execution of 
the design ; and Hastings, who was now in extreme 
peril, fled to Fulda. 

Soon after his arrival at Fulda, the expedition from 
Madras, commanded by Clive, appeared in the Hoogley. 
Warren, young, intrepid, and excited probably by the 
example of the Commander of the Forces who, having 
like himseK been a mercantile agent of the Company, 
had been turned by public calamities into a soldier, deter- 
mined to serve in the ranks. During the early opera- 
tions of the war he carried a musket. But the quick 
eye of Clive soon perceived that the head of the young 
volunteer would be more useful than his arm. When, 
after the battle of Plassey, Meer Jaffier was proclaimed 
Nabob of Bengal, Hastings was appointed to reside at 
the court of the new prince as agent for the Company, 

He remained at Moorshedabad till the year 1761, 
when he became a Member of Council, and was conse- 
quently forced to reside at Calcutta. This was during 



16 WAUilEN llASTIJVGiS. 

tLe interval between Olive's iirst and second adnjiuis- 
trations, an interval which has left on the fame of the 
East India Company a stain not wholly effaced by 
many years of ^ust and humane government. Mr. 
Vansittart, the Governor, was at the head of a new and 
anomalous empire. On one side was a band of Eng- 
lish functionaries, daring, intelligent, eager to be rich. 
On the other side was a great native population, help- 
less, timid, accustomed to crouch under oppression. 
To keep the stronger race from preying on the weaker 
was an undertaking which tasked to the utmost the 
talents and energy of Olive. Yansittart, with fair in- 
tentions, was a feeble and inefficient ruler. The master 
caste, as was natural, broke loose from all restraint ; 
and then was seen what we believe to be the most 
frightful of all spectacles, the strength of civilisation 
without its mercy. To all other despotism there is a 
check, imperfect, indeed, and liable to gross abuse, but 
still sufficient to preserve society from the last extreme 
of misery. A time comes when the evils of submission 
are obviously gi-eater than those of resistance, when 
fear itself begets a sort of courage, when a convulsive 
burst of popular rage and despair warns tyrants not to 
presume too far on the patience of mankind. But 
against misgovernment such as then afflicted Bengal 
it was impossible to struggle. The superior intelli- 
gence and energy of the rlominaut class made their 



WAKKEN HASTINGS. 17 

power irresistible. A war of Bengalees against Eng- 
lishmen was like a war of sheep against wolves, of men 
against dsemous. The only protection which the con- 
quered could find was in the moderation, the clemency, 
the enlarged policy of the conquerors. That protec- 
tion, at a later period, they found. But at first English 
power came among them unaccompanied by English 
morality. There was an interval between the time at 
which they became our subjects, and the time at which 
we began to reflect that we were bound to discharge 
towards them the duties of rulers. During that inter- 
val the business of a servant of the Company was 
simply to wring out of the natives a hundred or two 
hundred thousand pounds as speedily as possible, that 
he might return home before his constitution had 
suffered from the heat, to marry a peer's daughter, to 
buy rotten boroughs in Cornwall, and to give balls in 
St. James's Square. Of the conduct of Hastings at 
this time little is known ; but the little that is known, 
and the circumstance that little is known, must be con- 
sidered as honourable to him. He could not protect 
the natives : all that he could do was to abstain from 
plimdering and opj)ressing them ; and this he appears 
to have done. It is certain that at this time he con- 
tinued poor ; and it is equally certain that by cruelty 
and dishonesty he might easily have become rich. It 
is certain that lie was never charged with having borne 



18 vVAEilEN HASTINGS, 

a share in the worst abuses which theu prevailed; and 
it is almost ecjYtally certain that, if he had borne a 
share in those abuses, the able and bitter enemies who 
afterwards persecuted him would not have failed to 
discover and to proclaim his guilt. The keen, severe, 
and even malevolent scrutiny to which his whole public 
life was subjected, a scrutiny unparalleled, as we 
believe, in the history of mankind, is in one respect 
advantageous to his reputation. It brought many 
lamentable blemishes to light ; but it entitles him to 
be considered pure from every blemish which has not 
been brought to light. 

The truth is that the temptations to which so many 
English functionaries yielded in the time of Mr. Yan- 
sittart were not temptations addressed to the ruling 
passions of Warren Hastings. He was not squeamish 
in pecuniary transactions ; but he was neither sordid 
nor rapacious. He was far too enlightened a man to 
look on a great empire merely as a buccaneer would 
look on a galleon. Had his heart been much worse 
than it was, his understanding would have preserved 
him from that extremity of baseness. He was an un- 
scrupulous, perhaps an unprincipled statesman ; but 
still he was a statesman, and not a freebooter. 

In 1764 Hastings returned to England. He had 
realised only a very moderate fortune ; and that mode- 
rate fortune was soon reduced to nothing, partly by his 



WARHEN HASTINGS. 19 

praiseworthy liberality, and partly by liis mismanage- 
ment. Towards his relations he appears to have acted 
very generously. The greater part of his savings he 
left in Bengal, hoping probably to obtain the high 
usury of India. But high usury and bad security 
generally go together ; and Hastings lost both interest 
and principal. 

He remained four years in England. Of his life at 
this time very little is known. But it has been 
asserted, and is highly probable, that liberal studies 
and the society of men of letters occupied a great part 
of his time. It is to be remembered to his honour that, 
in days when the languages of the East were regarded 
by other servants of the Company merely as the means 
of communicating with weavers and money-changers, 
his enlarged and accomplished mind sought in Asiatic 
learning for new forms of intellectual enjoyment, and 
for new views of government and society. Perhaps, 
like most persons who have paid much attention to de- 
partments of knowledge which lie out of the common 
track, he was inclined to overrate the value of his 
favourite studies. He conceived that the cultivation 
of Persian literature might with advantage be made a 
part of the liberal education of an English gentleman ; 
and he drew up a plan with that view. It is said that 
the University of Oxford, in which Oriental learning 
|iad never, since the revival of letters, been wholly 



20 WARREN HABTINas. 

neglected, was to be the seat of the institution which he 
contemplated. An endowment was expected from the 
munificence of the Company ; and professors thoroughly 
competent to interpret Hafiz and Ferdubi were to be 
engaged in the East. Hastings called on Johnson, 
with the hope, as it should seem, of interesting in this 
project a man who enjoyed the highest literary reputa- 
tion, and who was particularly connected with Oxford, 
The interview appears to have left on Johnson's mind 
a most favourable impression of the talents and attain- 
ments of his visitor. Long after, when Hastings was 
ruling the immense population of British India, the 
old philosopher wrote to him, and referred in the most 
courtly terms, though with great dignity, to their short 
but agreeable intercourse. 

Hastings soon began to look again towards India. 
He had little to attach him to England ; and his 
pecuniary embarrassments were gi'eat. He solicited 
his old masters the Directors for employment. They 
acceded to his request, with high compliments both to 
his abilities and to his integrity, and appointed . him a 
Member of Council at Madras. It would be unjust 
not to mention that, though forced to borrow money 
for his outfit, he did not withdraw any portion of the 
sum which he had appropriated to the relief of his dis- 
tressed relations. In the spring of 1769 he embarked 
on board of the Dulce of Grafton, and commenced !\ 



WARKRN HASTINGS. 21 

voyage distinguished by iucideuts which might friruish 
matter for a novel. 

Among the passengers in the BuJce of Grafton was 
a German of the name of Imhoff . He called himself a 
Baron ; but he was in distressed circumstances, and 
was going out to Madras as a portrait painter, in the 
hope of picking up some of the pagodas which were 
then lightly got and as lightly spent by the English in 
India. The Baron was accompanied by his wife, a 
native, we have somewhere read, of Archangel. This 
young woman, who, born under the Arctic circle, was 
destined to play the part of a Queen under the tropic 
of Cancer, had an agreeable person, a cultivated mind, 
and manners in the highest degree engaging. She 
despised her husband heartily, and, as the story which 
we have to tell sufficiently proves, not without reason. 
She was interested by the conversation and flattered 
by the attentions of Hastings. The situation was 
indeed perilous. No place is so propitious to the 
formation either of close friendships or of deadly 
enmities as an Indiaman. There are very few people 
who do not find a voyage which lasted several months 
insupportably dull. Anything is welcome which may 
break that long monotony, a sail, a shark, an albatross, 
a man overboard. Most passengers find some resoui-ce 
in eating twice as many meals as on land. But the 
great devices for killing the time are quarrelling and 



22 WARREN HASTINGS. 

flirting. The facilities for both these exciting pursuits 
are great. The inmates of the ship are thrown to- 
gether far more than in any country-seat or boarding 
house. None can escape from the rest except by 
imprisoning himself in a cell in which he can hardly 
turn. All food, all exercise, is taken in company. 
Ceremony is to a great extent banished. It is every 
day in the power of a mischievous person to inflict in- 
numerable annoyances. It is every day in the power 
of an amiable person to confer little services. It not 
seldom happens that serious distress and danger call 
forth, in genuine beauty and deformity, heroic virtues 
and abject vices which, in the ordinary intercourse of 
good society, might remain during many years un- 
known even to intimate associates. Under such circum- 
stances met Warren Hastings and the Baroness Imhoff , 
two persons whose accomplishments would have at- 
tracted notice in any court of Europe. The gentleman 
had no domestic ties. The lady wag tied to a husband 
for whom she had no regard, and who had no regard 
for his own honour. An attachment sprang up, which 
was soon strengthened by events such as could hardly 
have occurred on land. Hastings f eU ill. The Baroness 
nursed him with womanly tenderness, gave him his 
medicines with her own hand, and even sat up in his 
cabin while he slept. Long before the Buke of Grafton 
reaqhed Madras, Hastings was in love. But his love 



WAEREN HASTINGS. 23 

v/as of a most characteristic description. Like his 
hatred, like his ambition, like all his passions, it was 
strong, but not impetuous. It was calm, deep, earnest, 
patient of delay, unconquerable by time. Imhoff was 
called into council by his wife and his wife's lover. It 
was arranged that the Baroness should institute a 
suit for a divorce in the courts of Franconia, that the 
Baron should afford every facility to the proceeding, 
and that, during the years which might elapse before 
fche sentence should be pronounced, they should continue 
to live together. It was also agreed that Hastings 
should bestow some very substantial marks of gratitude 
on the complaisant husband, and should, when the 
marriage was dissolved, make the lady his wife, and 
adopt the children whom she had already borne to 
tmhoff. 

At Madras, Hastings found the trade of the Company 
in a very disorganised state. His own taste would 
have led him rather to political than to commercial 
pursuits : but he knew that the favour of his employers 
depended chiefly on their dividends, and that their 
dividends depended chiefly on the investment. He 
therefore, with great judgment, determined to apply 
his vigorous mind for a time to this department of 
business, which had been much neglected, since the 
servants of the Company had ceased to be clerks, and 
had become warriors and negotiators. 



24 WARREN HASTINGS. 

Ill a very few montlis he effected an important 
reform. The Directors notified to him their high 
approbation, and were so much pleased with his 
conduct that they determined to place him at the head 
of the government of Bengal. Early in 1772 he 
quitted Fort St. George for his new post. The Imhoffs, 
who were still man and wife, accompanied him, and 
lived at Calcutta on the same plan which they ha(] 
already followed during more than two years. 

"When Hastings took his seat at the head of the 
council board, Bengal was still governed according to 
the system which Olive had devised, a system which 
was, perhaps, skilfully contrived for the purpose of 
facilitating and concealing a great revolution, but 
which, when that revolution was complete and irre- 
vocable, could produce nothing but inconvenience. 
There were two governments, the real and the osten- 
sible. The supreme power belonged to the Company, 
and was in truth the most despotic power that can be 
conceived. The only restraint on the English masters 
of the country was that which their own justice and 
humanity imposed on them. There was no constitu- 
tional check on their will, and resistance to them was 
utterly hopeless. 

But though thus absolute in reality, the English had 
not yet assumed the style of sovereignty. They held 
their territories as vassals of the throne of Dellji ; they 



WARTR,EN HASTINOS. 25 

nucod their revenues as collectors appoiuted by the 
imperial commission ; their public seal was inscribed 
with the imperial titles ; and their mint struck only the 
imperial coin. 

There was stiU a Nabob of Bengal, who stood to the 
English rulers of his country in the same relation in 
which Augustulus stood to Odoacer, or the last Mero- 
vingians to Charles Martel and Pepin. He lived at 
Moorshedabad, surrounded by princely magnificence. 
He was approached witli outward marks of reverence, 
and his name was used in public instruments. But 
in the government of the country he had less real 
share than the youngest writer or cadet in the Company's 
service. 

The English council which represented the Company 
at Calcutta was constituted on a very different plan 
from that which has since been adopted. At present 
the Governor is, as to all executive measures, absolute. 
He can declare war, conclude peace, appoint public 
functionaries or remove them, in opposition to the 
unanimous sense of those who sit with him in council. 
They are, indeed, entitled to know all that is done, to 
discuss all that is done, to advise, to remonstrate, to 
send protests to England. But it is with the Governor 
that the supreme power resides, and on him that the 
whole responsibility rests. This system, which was 
introduced by Mr. Pitt and Mr. Dundas in spit« of 



26 WARREN HASTING8. 

the strenuous opposition of Mr. Burke, we conceive to 
be on tlie whole the best that was ever devised for the 
government of a country where no materials can be 
found for a representative constitution. In the time of 
Hastings the Grovernor had only one vote in council, 
and, in case of an equal division, a casting vote. It 
therefore happened not unfrequently that he was over- 
ruled on the gravest questions ; and it was possible 
that he might be wholly excluded, for years together, 
from the real direction of public affairs. 

The English functionaries at Fort William had as 
yet paid little or no attention to the internal govern- 
ment of Bengal. The only branch of polities about 
which they much busied themselves was negotiation 
with the native princes. The police, the administration 
of justice, the details of the collection of revenue, wer6 
almost entirely neglected. We may remark that the 
phraseology of the Company's servants still bears the 
traces of this state of things. To this day they always 
use the word " political " as synonymous with " diplo- 
matic." We could name a gentleman still living, who 
was described by the highest authority as an invaluable 
public servant, eminently fit to be at the head of the 
internal administration of a whole presidency, but 
unfortunately quite ignorant of all political business. 

The internal government of Bengal the English 
rulers delegated to a great native minister, who was 



WARREN HASTINGS. 27 

stationed at Moorsliedabad. All military affairs, and, 
witli the exception of what pertains to mere ceremonial, 
all foreign affairs, were withdrawn from his control ; 
but the other departments of the administration were 
entirely confided to him. His own stipend^amounted to 
near a hundred thousand pounds sterling a year. The 
personal allowance of theN'abob, amounting to more than 
three hundred thousand pounds a year, passed through 
the minister's hands, and was, to a great extent, at his 
disposal. The collection of the revenue, the adminis- 
tration of justice, the maintenance of order, were left to 
this high functionary; and for the exercise of his 
immense power he was responsible to none but the 
British masters of the country. 

A situation so important, lucratire, and splendid, 
was naturally an object of ambition to the ablest and 
most powerful natives. Clive had found it difficult to 
decide between conflicting pretensions. Two candidates 
stood out prominently from the crowd, each of them 
the representative of a race and of a religion. 

One of these was Mahommed Reza Khan, a Mussul- 
man of Persian extraction, able, active, religious after 
the fashion of his people, and highly esteemed by them. 
In England he might perhaps have been regarded as a 
corrupt and greedy politician. But, tried by the lower 
standard of Indian morality, he might be considered as 
a man of integrity and honour. 



28 WABEEN HASTINGS. 

His competitor was a Hindoo Brahmiii whose name 
has, by a terrible and melancholy event, been insepa- 
rably associated with that of Warren Hastings, the 
Maharajah Il^uncomar. This man had played an 
important part in all the revolutions which, since the 
time of Surajah Dowlah, had taken place in Bengal. 
To the consideration which in that country belongs to 
high and pure caste, he added the weight which is 
derived from wealth, talents, and experience. Of his 
moral character it is difficult to give a notion to those 
who are acquainted with human nature only as it 
appears in our island. What the Italian is to the 
Englishman, what the Hindoo is to the Italian, what 
the Bengalee is to other Hindoos, that was !N"uncomar 
to other Bengalees. The physical organisation of the 
Bengalee is feeble even to effeminacy. He lives in a 
constant vapour bath. His pursuits are sedentary, his 
limbs delicate, his movements languid. During many 
ages he has been trampled upon by men of bolder and 
more hardy breeds. Courage, independence, veracity, 
are qualities to which his constitution and his situation 
are equally unfavourable. His mind bears a singular 
analogy to his body. . It is weak even to helplessness 
for x^urposes of manly resistance ; but its suppleness , 
and its tact move the children of sterner climates to 
admiration not unmingled with contempt. All those 
arts which are the natural defence of the weak are 



WARllEN HASTIIs'OS. 2^ 

more familiar to this subtle race than to tlie louiau of 
the time of Juvenal, or to the Jew of the dark ages. 
VVljat the horns are to the buffalo, what the paw is to 
the tiger, what the sting is to the bee, what beauty, 
according to the old Greek song, is to woman, deceit is 
to the Bengalee. Large promises, smooth excuses, 
elaborate tissues of circumstantial falsehood, chicanery, 
perjury, forgery, are the weapons, offensive and defen- 
sive, of the people of the Lower Ganges. All those 
millions do not furnish one sepoy to the armies of the 
Company. But as usurers, as money-changers, as 
sharp legal practitioners, no class of human beings 
can bear a comparison with them. With all his softness, 
the Bengalee is by no means placable in his enmities, 
or prone to pity. The pertinacity with wliich he 
adheres to his purposes yields only to the immediate.^ 
pressure of fear. Nor does he lack a certain kind of 
courage which is often wanting to his masters. To 
inevitable evils he is sometimes found to oppose a 
passive fortitude, such as the Stoics attributed to their 
ideal sage. An European warrior who rushes on a 
battery of cannon with a loud hurrah, will sometimes 
shriek under the surgeon's knife, and fall into an 
agony of despair at the sentence of death. Bat the 
Bengalee, who would see his country overrun, his 
house laid in ashes, his childi'en murdered or dis- 
honoured, without having the spirit to strike one blow, 



30 V/ABEEN HASTINGS. 

has yet been known to endure torture with the firmness 
of Mucins, and to mount the scaffold with the steady 
step and even pulse of Algernon Sidney. 

In iN'uncomar the national character was strongly 
and with exaggeration personified. The Company's 
servants had repeatedly detected him in the most 
criminal intrigues. On one occasion he brought a 
false charge against another Hindoo, and tried to sub- 
stantiate it by producing forged documents. On 
another occasion it was discovered that, while pro- 
fessing the strongest attachment to the English, he 
was engaged in several conspiracies against them, and 
in particular that he was the medium of a correspon- 
dence between the Court of Delhi and the French 
authorities in the Carnatic. For these and similar 
practices he had been long detained in confijiement. 
But his talents and influence had not only procured 
his liberation, but had obtained for him a certain 
degree of consideration even among the British rulers 
of his country. 

Olive was extremely unwilling to place a Mussulman 
at the head of the administration of Bengal. On the 
other hand, he could not bring himseK to confer 
immense power on a man to whom every sort of 
villany had repeatedly been brought home. There- 
fore, though the ll^abob, over whom N'uncomar had by 
intrigue acquired great influence, begged that the 



WARRKN RA STINGS. 31 

artf uJ Hindoo might be iu trusted witli the government, 
Olive, after some hesitation, decided honestly and 
wisely in favour of Mahommed Reza Khan. When 
Hastings became Governor, Mahommed Reza Khan 
}'.ad held power seven years. An infant son of Meer 
Jaffier was now Nabob ; and the guardianship of the 
young prince's person had been confided to the minister. 
Nuncomar, stimulated at once by cupidity and 
malice, had been constantly attempting to hurt the 
reputation of his successful rival. This was not 
difficult. The revenues of Bengal, under the adminis- 
tration established by Olive, did not yield such a 
surplus as had been anticipated by the Company ; for, 
at that time, the most absurd notions were entertained 
in England respecting the wealth of India. Palaces 
of porphyry, hung with the richest brocade, heaps of 
pearls and diamonds, vaults from wbicb pagodas and 
gold mohurs were measured out by the bushel, filled 
the imagination even of men of business. Nobody 
seemed to be aware of what nevertheless was most un- 
doubtedly the truth, that India was a poorer country 
than countries which in Europe are reckoned poor ; 
than Ireland, for example, or than Portugal. It was 
confidently believed by Lords of the Treasury and 
members for the city that Bengal would not only 
defray its own charges, but would a:fford an increased 
(Uyideud to the proprietors of India stock, and large 



32 WARREN HASTIWaS. 

relief to the English fiuauces. These absurd expecta- 
tions were disappointed; and the Directors, naturally 
enough, chose to attribute the disappoiTitmeut rather 
to the mismanagement of Mahommed Heza Khan than 
to their own ignorance of the country intrusted to their 
care. They were confirmed in their error by the 
agents of Nuncomar, for Nuncomar had agents even 
in Leadenhall Street. Soon after Hastings reached 
Calcutta, he i-eceived a letter addressed by the Court 
of Directors, not to the Council generally, but to 
himself in particular. He was directed to remove 
Mahommed Reza Khan, to arrest him, together with 
all his family and all his partisans, and to institute a 
strict inquiry into the whole administration of the 
province. It was added that the Governor would do 
well to avail himself of the assistance of Nuncomar in 
the investigation. The vices of Nuncomar were ac- 
knowledged. But even from his vices, it was said, 
much advantage might at such a conjuncture be derived; 
and, though he could not safely be trusted, it might 
still be proper to encourage him by hopes of reward. 

The Governor bore no good will to Nuncomar. 
Many years before, they had known each other at 
Moorshedabad ; and then a quarrel had arisen between 
them which all the authority of their superiors could 
hardly compose. "Widely as they differed in most 
points, they resembled each other in this, that both 



WARREN HASTINGS. 66 

were men of unforgiving natures. To Mahommed 
Reza Khan, on the other hand, Hastings had no feel- 
ings of hostility. Nevertheless he proceeded to exe- 
cute the instructions of the Company with an alacrity 
which he never showed, except when instructions were 
in perfect conformity with his own views. He had, 
wisely as we think, determined to get rid of the system 
of double government in Bengal. The orders of the 
Directors furnished him with the means of effecting 
his purpose, and dispensed him from the necessity of 
discussing the matter with his Council. He took his 
measures with his usual vigour and dexterity. At 
midnight, the palace of Mahommed Reza Khan at 
Moorshedabad was surrounded by a battalion of 
sepoys. The minister was roused from his slum- 
bers and informed that he was a prisoner. With 
the Mussulman gravity, he bent his head and 
submitted himself to the will of Grod. He feD 
not alone. A chief named Schitab Roy had been 
intrusted with the government of Bahar. His 
valour and his attachment to the English had 
more than once been signally proved. On that 
memorable day on which the people of Patna saw 
from their walls the whole army of the Mogul 
scattered by the little band of Captain Knox, the voice 
of the British conquerors assigned the palm of 
gallantry to the brave Asiatic. " I never," said Kuox, 
B— 1 



34 WARREN HASTINGS. 

when he introduced Schitab Roy, covered with blood 
and dust, to the English functionaries assembled in 
the factory, "I never saw a native fight so before." 
Schitab E-oy was involved in the ruin of Mahommed 
Reza Khan, was removed from office, and was placed 
under arrest. The members of the Council received 
no intimation of these measures till these prisoners 
were on their road to Calcutta. 

The inquiry into the conduct of the minister was 
postponed on different pretences. He was detained in 
an easy confinement during many months. In the 
meantime, the great revolution which Hastings had 
planned was carried into effect. The office of Minister 
was abolished. The internal administration was trans- 
ferred to the servants of the Company. A system, a 
very imperfect system, it is true, of civil and criminal 
justice, under English superintendence, was established. 
The Nabob was no longer to have even an ostensible 
share in the government ; but he was still to receive a 
considerable annual allowance, and to be surrounded 
with the state of sovereignty. As he was an infant, 
it was necessary to provide guardians for his person 
and property. His person was intrusted to a lady of 
his father's harem, known by the name of the Munny 
Begum. The office of treasurer of the household was 
bestowed on a son of Nuncomar, named Goordas. 
Nuncomar's services were wanted ; yet he could not 



WARREN HASTINGS. 35 

safely be trusted with power ; and Hastings thought it 
& masterstroke of policy to reward the able and un- 
principled parent by promoting the inoffensive child. 

The revolution completed, the double government 
dissolved, the Company installed in the full sove- 
reignty of Bengal, Hastings had no motive to treat the 
late ministers with rigour. Their trial had been put 
off on various pleas till the new organisation was com- 
plete. They were then brought before a committee, 
over which the Governor presided. Schitab Roy was 
speedily acquitted with honour. A formal apology 
was made to him for the restraint to which he had 
been subjected. All the Eastern marks of respect 
were bestowed on him. He was clothed in a robe of 
state, presented with jewels and with a richly harnessed 
elephant, and sent back to his government at Patna. 
But his health had suffered from confinement; his 
high spirit had been cruelly wounded ; and soon after 
his liberation he died of a broken heart. 

The innocence of Mahommed Reza Khan was not so 
clearly established. But the Governor was not dis- 
posed to deal harshly. After a long hearing, in which 
Nuncomar appeared as the accuser, and displayed both 
the art and the inveterate rancour which distinguished 
him, Hastings pronounced that the charge had not 
been made out, and ordered the fallon minister to be 
set at liberty. 



36 WARREN HASTINGS. 

Nuncomar had purposed to destroy the Mussulman 
admmistration, and to rise on its ruin. Both his 
malevolence and his cupidity had been disappointed 
Hastings had made him a tool, and used him for the 
purpose of accomplishing the transfer of the govern- 
ment from Moorshedabad to Calcutta, from native to 
European hands. The rival, the enemy, so long 
envied, so implacably persecuted, had been dismissed 
unhurt. The situation so long and ardently desired 
had been abolished. It was natural that the Governor 
should be from that time an object of the most intense 
hatred to the vindictive Brahmin. As yet, however, 
it was necessary to suppress such feelings. The time 
was coming when that long animosity was to end in a 
desperate and deadly struggle. 

In the meantime, Hastings was compelled to turn 
his attention to foreign affairs. The object of his 
diplomacy was at this time simply to get money. The 
finances of his government were in an embarrassed 
state, and this embarrassment he was determined to 
relieve by some means, fair or foul. The principle 
which directed all his dealings with his neighbours is 
fully expressed by the old motto of one of the great 
predatory families of Teviotdale, "Thou shalt want ere 
I want." He seems to have laid it down, as a funda- 
mental proposition which could not be disputed, that, 
when he had not as many lacs of rupees as the public 



WARREN HASTINGS. o7 

(Service required, he was to take them from anybody 
who had. One thin^^, indeed, is to be said in excuse 
for him. The pressure a^^plied to him by his employers 
at home was such as only the highest virtue could 
have withstood, such as left him no choice except to 
commit great wrongs, or to resign his high post, and 
with that post all his hopes of fortune and distinction. 
The Directors, it is true, never enjoined or applauded any 
crime. Far from it. Whoever examines their letters 
written at that time, will find there many just and 
humane sentiments, many excellent precepts, in short, 
an admirable code of political ethics. But every ex- 
hortation is modified or nullified by a demand for money. 
" Govern leniently, and send more money ; practise 
strict justice and moderation towards neighbouring 
powers, and send more money ; " this is, in truth, the 
sum of almost all the instructions that Hastings ever 
received from home. Now these instructions, being inter- 
preted, mean simply, " Be the father and the oppressor of 
the people ; be just and unjust, moderate and rapacious." 
The Directors dealt with India, as the Church, in the 
good old times, dealt with a heretic. They delivered 
the victim over to the executioners, with an earnest 
request that all possible tenderness might be shown. 
We by no means accuse or suspect those who 
framed these despatches of hypocrisy. It is probable 
that, writing fifteen thousand miles from the place 



38 sVAiiiijjN Hastings. 

where their orders were to be carried into effect, tiiey 
never perceived the gross inconsistency of which they 
were guilty ; but the inconsistency was at once mani- 
fest to their vicegerent at Calcutta, who, with an 
empty treasury, with an unpaid army, with his own 
salary often in arrear, with deficient crops, with 
government tenants daily running away, was called 
upon to remit home another half million without fail. 
Hastings saw that it was absolutely necessary for him 
to disregard either the moral discourses or the pecuniary 
requisitions of his employers. Being forced to dis- 
obey them in something, he had to consider what kind 
of disobedience they would most readily pardon ; and 
he correctly judged that the safest course would be to 
neglect the sermons and to find the rupees. 

A mind so fertile as his, and so little restrained by 
conscientious scruples, speedily discovered several modes 
of relieving the financial embarrassments of the govern- 
ment. The allowance of the Nabob of Bengal was 
reduced at a stroke from three hundred and twenty 
thousand pounds a year to haK that sum. The 
Company had bound itself to pay near three hundred 
thousand pounds a year to the Great Mogul as a mark 
of homage for the provinces which he had intrusted to 
their care ; and they had ceded to him the districts of 
Corah and Allahabad. On the plea that the Mogul 
was not really independent, but merely a tool in the 



WARREN HASTINGS. 39 

hands of others, Hastings determined to retract these 
concessions. He accordingly declared that the English 
would pay no more tribute, and sent troops to occupy 
Allahabad and Corah. The situation of these places 
was such, that there would be little advantage and 
great expense in retaining them. Hastings, who 
wanted money, and not territory, determined to seE 
them. A purchaser was not wanting. The rich 
province of Oude had, in the general dissolution of the 
Mogul Empire, fallen to the share of the great 
Mussulman House by which it is still governed. 
About twenty years ago, this House, by the permission 
of the British government, assumed the royal title ; 
but in the time of Warren Hastings such an assump- 
tion would have been considered by the Mahommedans 
of India as a monstrous impiety. The Prince of Oude, 
though he held the power, did not venture to use the 
style of sovereignty. To the appellation of Kabob or 
Viceroy, he added that of Yizier of the monarchy of 
Hindostan, just as in the last century the Electors of 
Saxony and Brandenburg, though independent of the 
Emperor, and often in arms against him, were proud 
to style themselves his Grand Chamberlain and G-rand 
Marshal. Sujah Dowlah, then Nabob Yizier, was on 
excellent terms with the English. He had a large 
treasure. Allahabad and Corah were so situated that 
they might be of use to him, and could be of none to 



40 WARREN HASTINGS. 

the Company. Tlie buyer and seller soon came to an 
understanding; and the provinces which had been torn 
from the Mogul were made over to the government of 
Oude for about haK a million sterling. 

But there was another matter still more important 
to be settled by the Yizier and the Grovemor. The 
fate of a brave people was to be decided. It was 
decided in a manner which has left a lasting stain on 
the fame of Hastings and of England. 

The people of Central Asia had always been to the 
inhabitants of India what the warriors of the German 
forests were to the subjects of the decaying monarchy 
of Rome. The dark, slender, and timid Hindoo shrank 
from a conflict with the strong muscle and resolute 
spirit of the fair race which dwelt beyond the passes. 
There is reason to believe that, at a period anterior to 
the dawn of regular history, the people who spoke the 
rich and flexible Sanscrit came from regions lying far 
beyond the Hyphasis and the Hystaspes, and imposed 
their yoke on the children of the soil. It is certain 
that, during the last ten centuries, a succession of in- 
vaders descended from the west on Hindostan ; nor 
was the course of conquest ever turned back towards 
the setting sun, till that memorable campaign in which 
the cross of Saint George was planted on the walla of 
Ghizni. 

The Emperors of Hindostan themselves came from 



WARUEN HASTINGS, 41 

the other side of the great mouutain ridge ; and it had 
always been their practice to recruit their army from 
the hardy and raliant race from which their own 
illustrious House sprang. Among the military ad- 
venturers who were allured to the Mogul standards 
from the neighbourhood of Cabul and Candahar, were 
conspicuous several gallant bauds, known by the name 
of the Rohillas. Their services had been rewarded 
with large tracts of land, fiefs of the spear, if we may 
use an expression drawn from an analogous state of 
things, in that fertile plain through which the 
Ramgunga flows from the snowy heights of Kumaon 
to join the Ganges. In the general confusion which 
followed the death of Aurungzebe, the warlike colony 
became virtually independent. The Rohillas were dis- 
tinguished from the other inhabitants of India by a 
peculiarly fair complexion. They were more honourably 
distinguished by courage in war, and by skill in the 
arts of peace. While anarchy raged from Lahore to 
Cape Oomorin, their little territory enjoyed the bless- 
ings of repose under the guardianship of valour. 
Agriculture and commerce flourished among them ; 
nor were they negligent of rhetoric and poetry. 
Many persons now living have heard aged men talk 
with regret of the golden days when the Afghan 
princes ruled in the vale of Rohilcund. 

Sujah Dowlah had set his heart on adding this rich 



42 WA.RREN HASTINGS. 

district to his own principality. Right, or show of 
right, he had absolutely none. His claim was in no 
respect better founded than that of Catherine to Po- 
land, or that of the Bonaparte family to Spain. The 
Rohillas held their country by exactly the same title 
by which he held his, and had governed their country 
far better than his had ever been governed. Nor were 
they a people whom it was perfectly safe to attack. 
Their land was indeed an open plain, destitute of 
natural defences ; but their veins were full of the high 
blood of Afghanistan. As soldiers, they had not the 
steadiness which is seldom found except in company 
with strict discipline ; but their impetuous valour had 
been proved on many fields of battle. It was said that 
their chiefs, when united by common peril, could bring 
eighty thousand men into the field. Sujah Dowlah 
had himself seen them fight, and wisely shrank from a 
conflict with them. There was in India one army, and 
only one, against which even those proud Caucasian 
tribes could not stand. It had been abundantly proved 
that neither tenfold odds, nor the martial ardour of the 
boldest Asiatic nations, could avail ought against 
English science and resolution. Was it possible to 
induce the Governor of Bengal to let out to hire the 
irresistible energies of the imperial people, the skill 
against which the ablest chiefs of Hindostan were 
helpless as infants, the discipline which had so often 



WAKRF.N HASTINGS. 43 

triumphed over the frantic struggles of fanaticism and 
despair', the unconquerable British courage which is 
never so sedate and stubborn as towards the close of 
a doubtful and murderous day ? 

This was what the Nabob Vizier asked, and what 
Hastings granted- A bargain was soon struck. Each 
of the negotiators had what the other wanted. 
Hastings was in need of funds to carry on the govern- 
ment of Bengal, and to send remittances to London ; 
and Sujah Dowlah had an ample revenue. Sujah 
Dowlah was bent on subjugating the Rohillas ; and 
Hastings had at his disposal the only force by which 
the E-ohillas could be subjugated. It was agreed that 
an English army should be lent to the Nabob Yizier, 
and that, for the loan, he should pay four hundred 
thousand pounds sterling, besides defraying all the 
charge of the troops while employed in his service. 

" I really cannot see," says Mr. Grleig, " upon what 
grounds, either of political or moral justice, this pro- 
position deserves to be stigmatised as infamous." If 
we understand the meaning of words, it is infamous 
to commit a wicked action for hire, and it is wicked to 
engage in war without provocation. In this particular 
war, scarcely one aggravating circumstance was 
wanting. The object of the Rohilla war was this, to 
deprive a large population, who had never done us the 
least harm, of a good government, and to place them, 



44 WARREN HASTINGS. 

against their will, under an execrably bad one. Nay, 
even this is not all, England now descended far 
below the level even of those petty German princes 
who, about the same time, sold us troops to fight the 
Americans. The Hussarmongers of Hesse and An- 
spach had at least the assurance that the expeditions on 
which their soldiers were to be employed would be 
conducted in conformity with the humane rules of 
civilised warfare. Was the Rohilla war likely to be 
so conducted? Did the Governor stipulate that it 
should be so conducted ? He well knew what Indian 
warfare was. He well knew that the power which he 
covenanted to put into Sujah Dowlah's hands would, 
in all probability, be atrociously abused, and he re- 
quired no guarantee, no promise, that it should not be 
so abused. He did not even reserve to himself the 
right of withdrawing his aid in case of abuse, however 
gross. We are almost ashamed to notice Major Scott's 
plea, that Hastings was justified in letting out English 
troops to slaughter the Rohillas, because the Rohillas 
were not of Indian race, but a colony from a distant 
country. What were the English themselves ? Was 
it for them to proclaim a crusade for the expulsion of 
all intruders from the countries watered by the 
Ganges ? Did it lie in their mouths to contend that a 
foreign settler who establishes an empire in India is a 
caput lupinum ? What would they have said if any 



WARREN HASTINGS. 45 

other power had, ou such a ground, attacked Madras 
or Calcutta, without the slightest provocation ? Such 
a defence was wanting to make the infamy of the 
transaction complete. The atrocity of the crime, and 
the hypocrisy of the apology, are worthy of each 
other. 

One of the three brigades of which the Bengal army 
consisted, was sent under Colonel Champion to join 
Sujah Dowlah's forces. The Rohillas expostulated, 
entreated, offered a large ransom, but in vain. They 
then resolved to defend themselves to the last. A 
bloody battle was fought. " The enemy," says Colonel 
Champion, "gave proof of a good share of military 
knowledge ; and it is impossible to describe a more 
obstinate firmness of resolution than they displayed." 
The dastardly sovereign of Oude fled from the field. 
The English were left unsupported ; but their fire and 
their charge were irresistible. It was not, however, 
till the most distinguished chiefs had fallen, fighting 
bravely at the head of their troops, that the Rohilla 
ranks gave way. Then the Nabob Yizier and his 
rabble made their appearance, and hastened to plunder 
the camp of the valiant enemies whom they had never 
dared to look in the face. The soldiers of the 
Company, trained in an exact discipline, kept un- 
broken order, while the tents were pillaged by these 
worthless allies. But many voices were heard to 



46 WARREN HASTINGS. 

exclaim, " We have had all the fighting, and those 
rogues are to have all the profit." 

Then the horrors of Indian war were let loose on 
the fair valleys and cities of Rohilcund. The whole 
country was in a blaze. More than a hundred thousand 
people fled from their homes to pestilential jungles, 
preferring famine, and fever, and the haunts of tigers, 
to the tyranny of him to whom an English and a 
Christian government had, for shameful lucre, sold 
their substance, and their blood, and the honour of 
their wives and daughters. Colonel Champion remon- 
strated with the Nabob Yizier, and sent strong repre- 
sentations to Fort William; but the Governor had 
made no conditions as to the mode in which the war 
was to be carried on. He had troubled himself about 
nothing but his forty lacs ; and, though he might dis- 
approve of Sujah Dowlah's wanton barbarity, he did 
not think himself entitled to interfere, except by of- 
fering advice. This delicacy excites the admiration of 
the biographer. " Mr. Hastings," he says, " could not 
himseK dictate to the Nabob, nor permit the com- 
mander of the Company's troops to dictate how the 
war was to be carried on." No, to be sure. Mr. 
Hastings had only to put down by main force the 
brave struggles of innocent men fighting for their 
liberty. Their military resistance crushed, his duties 
ended ; and he h^^d theri only to fold his arms jiud look 



WARREN HASTINGS. 47 

on. while their villages were burned, their children 
butchered, and their women violated. Will Mr. Gleig 
seriously maintain this opinion ? Is any rule more 
plain than this, that whoever voluntarily gives to an- 
other irresistible power over human beings, is bound 
to take order that such power shall not be barbarously 
abused? But we beg pardon of our readers for 
arguing a point so clear. 

We hasten to the end of this sad and disgraceful 
story. The war ceased. The finest population in 
India was subjected to a greedy, cowardly, cruel 
tyrant. Commerce and agriculture languished. The 
rich province which had tempted the cupidity of Sujah 
Dowlah became the most miserable part even of his 
miserable dominions. Yet is the injured nation not 
extinct. A.t long intervals, gleams of its ancient spirit 
have flashed forth ; and even at this day, valour, and 
self-respect, and a chivalrous feeling rare among 
Asiatics, and a bitter remembrance of the great crime 
of England, distinguish that noble Afghan race. To 
this day they are regarded as the best of all sepoys at 
the cold steel ; and it was very recently remarked, by 
one who had enjoyed great opportunities of observa- 
tion, that the only natives of India to whom the word 
"gentleman" can with perfect propriety be applied, 
are to be found among the Rohillas. 

Whatever we may think of the morality of Hastings, 



48 WARKEN HASTINGS. 

it cannot be denied that the financial results of his 
policy did honour to his talents. In less than two 
years after he assumed the government, he had, without 
imposing any additional burdens on the people subject 
to his authority, added about four hundred and fifty 
thousand pounds to the annual income of the Company, 
besides procuring about a million in ready money. He 
had also relieved the finances of Bengal from military 
expenditure, amounting to near a quarter of a million 
a year, and had thrown that charge on the Nabob of 
Oude. There can be no doubt that this was a result 
which, if it had been obtained by honest means, would 
have entitled him to the warmest gratitude of his 
country, and which, by whatever means obtained, 
proved that he possessed great talents for administra- 
tion. 

In the meantime. Parliament had been engaged in 
long and grave discussions on Asiatic affairs. The 
ministry of Lord North, in the session of 1773, intro- 
duced a measure which made a considerable change in 
the constitution of the Indian government. This law, 
known by the name of the Regulating Act, provided 
that the presidency of Bengal should exercise a control 
over the other possessions of the Company ; that the 
chief of that presidency should be styled Governor- 
General; that he should be assisted by four 
Councillors; and that a supreme court of judicature, 



WARRKN HASTINGS. 49 

consisting of a chief justice and tliree inferior judges, 
should be established at Calcutta. This court was 
made independent of the Governor- General and 
Council, and was intrusted with a civil and criminal 
jurisdiction of immense and, at the same time, of un- 
defined extent. 

The Governor- General and Coimcillors were named 
in the act, and were to hold their situations for five 
years. Hastings was to be the first Governor- 
General. One of the four new Councillors, Mr. 
Harwell, an experienced servant of the Company, was 
then in India. The other three, General Clavering, 
Mr. Monson, and Mr. Francis, were sent out from 
England. 

The ablest of the new Councillors was, beyond all 
doubt, Philip Francis. His acknowledged composi- 
tions prove that he possessed considerable eloquence 
and information. Several years passed in the public 
offices had formed him to habits of business. His 
enemies have never denied that he had a fearless and 
manly spirit; and his friends, we are afraid, must 
acknowledge that his estimate of himself was extrava- 
gantly high, that his temper was irritable, that his 
deportment was often rude and petulant, and that his 
hatred was of intense bitterness and long duration. 

It is scarcely possible to mention this eminent man 
vrithout adverting for a moment to the question which 



50 WARREN HASTINGS. 

his name at once suggests to every mind. Was he tha 
author of the Letters of Junius ? Our own firm belief 
is that he was. The evidence is, we think, such as 
would support a verdict in a civil, nay, in a criminal 
proceeding. The handwriting of Junius is the very 
peculiar handwriting of Francis, slightly disguised. 
As to the position, pursuits, and connections of Junius, 
the following are the most important facts which can 
be considered as clearly proved : first, that he was 
acquainted with the technical forms of the secretary 
of state's office ; secondly, that he was intimately ac- 
quainted with the business of the War Office ; thirdly, 
that he, during the year 1770, attended debates in the 
House of Lords, and took notes of speeches, parti- 
cularly of the speeches of Lord Chatham; fourthly, 
that he bitterly resented the appointment of Mr. 
Chamier to the place of deputy secretary-at-war ; 
fifthly, that he was bound by some strong tie to the 
first Lord Holland. Now, Francis passed some years 
in the secretary of state's office. He was subsequently 
chief clerk of the War Office. He repeatedly men- 
tioned that he had himseK, in 1770, heard speeches of 
Lord Chatham, and some of these speeches were 
actually printed from his notes. He resigned his 
clerkship at the War Office from resentment at the 
appointment of Mr. Chamier. It was by Lord Hol- 
land that he was first introduced into the public sei-vice. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 51 

Now, here are five marks, all of which ought to bo 
found in Junius. They are all five found in Francis. 
We do not believe that more than two of them can be 
found in any other person whatever. If this argument 
does not settle the question, there is an end of all 
reasoning on circumstantial evidence. 

The internal evidence seems to us to point the same 
way. The style of Francis bears a strong resemblance 
to that of Junius ; nor are we disposed to admit, what 
is generally taken for granted, that the acknowledged 
compositions of Francis are very decidedly inferior to 
the anonymous letters. The argument from inferiority, 
at all events, is one which may be urged with at least 
equal force against every claimant that has ever been 
mentioned, with the single exception of Burke; and 
it would be a waste of time to prove that Burke was 
not Junius. And what conclusion, after all, can be 
drawn from mere inferiority? Every writer must 
produce his best work ; and the interval between his 
best work and his second best work may be very wide 
indeed. Nobody wiU say that the best letters of 
Junius are more decidedly superior to the acknowledged 
works of Francis than three or four of Oorneille's 
tragedies to the rest, than three or four of Ben Jon- 
son's comedies to the rest, than the Pilgrim's 
Progress to the other works of Bunyan, than Don 
Quixote to the other works of Cervantes. Nay, it is 



52 WARREN HASTINGS, 

certain that Junius, whoever he may have been, was 
a most unequal writer. To go no further than the 
letters which bear the signature of Junius ; the letter 
to the King, and the letters to Home Tooke, have 
little in common, except the asperity; and asperity 
was an ingredient seldom wanting either in the writings 
or in the speeches of Francis. 

Indeed, one of the strongest reasons for believing 
that Francis was Junius is the moral resemblance be- 
tween the two men. It is not difficult, from the letters 
which, under various signatures, are known to have 
been written by Junius, and from his dealings with 
Woodf all and others, to form a tolerably correct notion 
of his character. He was clearly a man not destitute 
of real patriotism and magnanimity, a man whose vices 
were not of a sordid kind. But he must also have 
been a man in the highest degree arrogant and insolent, 
a man prone to malevolence, and prone to the error of 
mistaking his malevolence for public virtue. " Doest 
thou well to be angry ? " was the question asked in 
old time of the Hebrew prophet. And he answered, 
"I do well." This was evidently the temper of 
Junius; and to this cause we attribute the savage 
cruelty which disgraces several of his letters. No 
man is so merciless as he who, under a strong self- 
delusion, confounds his antipathies with his duties. 
It may be added that Junius, though allied with the 



WARREN HASTINGS. 53 

(iBinocratic party by common enmiities, was the very 
<jpposito of a democratic politician. "While attacking 
mdivjduais with a ferocity which perpetually violated 
all the laws of literary warfare, he regarded the most 
defectiva parts of old institutions with a respect 
amounting to pedantry, pleaded the cause of Old 
Sarum with fervour, and contemptuously told the 
capitalists of Manchester and Leeds that, if they 
wanted votes, they might buy land and become free- 
holders of Lancashire and Yorkshire. All this, we 
believe, might stand, with scarcely any change, for 
a character of Philip Francis. 

It is not strange that the great anonymous writer 
should have been willing at that time to leave the 
country which had been so powerfully stirred by his 
eloquence. Everything had gone against him. That 
party which he clearly preferred to every other, the 
party of George Grenville, had been scattered by the 
death of its chief ; and Lord Suffolk had led the 
greater part of it over to the ministerial benches. The 
ferment produced by the Middlesex election had gone 
down. JEvery faction must have been alike an object 
of aversion to Junius. His opinions on domestic 
affairs separated him from the ministry ; his opinions 
on colonial affairs from the opposition. Under such 
circumstances, he had thrown down his pen in misan- 
thropical despair. His farewell letter to Woodfall 



54 WAEREN HASTINGS. 

bears date the nineteenth of January, 1773. In that 
letter, he declared that he must be an idiot to write 
again ; that he had meant well by the cause and the 
public ; that both were given up ; that there were not 
ten men who would act steadily together on any 
question. " But it is all alike,'* he added, " vile and 
contemptible. You have never flinched that 1 know 
of ; and I shall always rejoice to hear of your pros- 
perity. " These were the last words of Junius. In 
a year from that time, Philip Francis was on his 
voyage to Bengal. 

With the three new Councillors came out the Judges 
of the Supreme Court. The Chief Justice was Sir 
Elijah Impey. He was an old acquaintance of 
Hastings ; and it is probable that the Governor- General, 
if he had searched through all the inns of court, could 
not have found an equally serviceable tool. But the 
members of Council were by no means in an obsequious 
mood. Hastings greatly disliked the new form of 
government, and had no very high opinion of his coad- 
jutors. They had heard of this, and were disposed to 
be suspicious and punctilious. When men are in such 
a frame of mind, any trifle is sufficient to give occa- 
sion for dispute. The members of Council expected a 
salute of twenty-one guns from the batteries of Fort 
William. Hastings allowed them only seventeen. 
They landed in ill-humour. The first ciyiUties were 



WARREN HASTINGS. 56 

exchanged with cold reserve. On the morrow com- 
menced that long quarrel which, after distracting 
British India, was renewed in England, and in which 
all the most eminent statesmen and orators of the age 
took active part on one or the other side. 

Hastings was supported by Barwell. They had not 
always been friends. But the arrival of the new 
members of Council from England naturally had the 
effect of uniting the old servants of the Company. 
Clavering, Monson, and Francis formed the majority. 
They instantly wrested the government out of the 
hands of Hastings, condemned, certainly not without 
justice, his late dealings with the Nabob Yizier, re- 
called the English agent from Oude, and sent thither a 
creature of their own, ordered the brigade which had 
conquered the unhappy Rohillas to return to the 
Company's territories, and instituted a severe inquiry 
into the conduct of the war. Next, in spite of the 
Governor- G-eneral's remonstrances, they proceeded to 
exercise, in the most indiscreet manner, their new 
authority over the subordinate presidencies ; threw all 
the affairs of Bombay into confusion ; and interfered, 
with an incredible union of rashness and feebleness, in 
the intestine disputes of the Mahratta government. 
At the same time, they fell on the internal adminis- 
tration of Bengal, and attacked the whole fiscal and 
Judicial system, a system which was undoubtedly 



56 WARREN HASTINGS. 

defective, but which it was very improbable that 
gentlemen fresh from England would be competent to 
amend. The effect of their reforms was that all pro- 
tection to life and property was withdrawn, and that 
gangs of robbers plundered and slaughtered with 
impunity in the very suburbs of Calcutta. Hastings 
continued to live in the Government-house, and to draw 
the salary of Goveruor-G-eneral. He continued even 
to take the lead at the council-board in the transaction 
of ordinary business ; for his opponents could not but 
feel that he knew much of which they were ignorant, 
and that he decided, both surely and speedily, many 
questions which to them would have been hopelessly 
puzzling. But the higher powers of government and 
the most valuable patronage had been taken from 
him. 

The natives soon found this out. They considered 
him afeLi fallen man ; and they acted after their kind. 
Some of our readers may have seen, in India, a cloud 
of crows pecking a sick vulture to death, no bad type 
of what happens in that country, as often as fortune 
deserts one who has been great and dreaded. In an 
instant, all the sycophants who had lately been ready 
to lie for him, to forge for him, to pander for him, to 
poison for him, hasten to purchase the favour of his 
victorious enemies by accusing him. An Indian 
government has only to let it be understood that it 



WARREN HASTINGS. 5/ 

wishes a particular man to be mined ; and, in twenty- 
four hours, it will be furnished witb grave charges, 
supported by depositions so full and circiunstantial 
that any person unaccustomed to Asiatic mendacity 
would regard them as decisive. It is well if the sig- 
nature of the destined victim is not counterfeited at 
the foot of some illegal compact, and if some treason- 
able paper is not slipped into a hiding-place in his 
house. Hastings was now regarded as helpless. The 
power to make or mar the fortune of every man in 
Bengal had passed, as it seemed, into the hands of 
the new Councillors. Immediately charges against 
the Governor- General began to pour in. They were 
eagerly welcomed by the majority, who, to do them 
justice, were men of too much honour knowingly to 
countenance false accusations, but who were not 
suflQciently acquainted with the East to be aware that, 
in that part of the world, a very little encourm^ement 
from power wiU call f ortk, in a week, more Oateses, and 
Bedloes, and Dangerfields, than Westminster Hall sees 
in a century. 

It would have been strange indeed if, at such a 
juncture, Nuncomar had remained quiet. That bad 
man was stimulated at once by malignity, by avarice, 
and by ambition. Now was the time to be avenged on 
his old enemy, to wreak a grudge of seventeen years, 
to establish himseK in the favour of the majority of 



58 WARREN HASTINGS. 

the Council, to become the greatest uative in Bengal. 
From the time of the arrival of the new Councillors, 
he had paid the most marked court to them, and had in 
consequence been excluded, with all indignity, from 
the Grovernment-house. He now put into the hands of 
Francis, with great ceremony, a paper, containing 
several charges of the most serious description. By 
this document Hastings was accused of putting offices 
up for sale, and of receiving bribes for suffering 
offenders to escape. In particular, it was alleged 
that Mahommed Reza Khan had been dismissed with 
impunity, in consideration of a great sum paid to the 
Governor-General. 

Francis read the paper in Council. A violent 
altercation followed. Hastings complained in bitter 
terms of the way in which he was treated, spoke with 
contempt of Nuncomar and of Nuncomar's accusation, 
and diiiaied the right of the Council to sit in judgment 
on the Governor. At the next meeting of the Board, 
another communication from Nuncomar was produced. 
He requested that he might be permitted to attend 
the Council, and that he might be heard in support of 
his assertions. Another tempestuous debate took place. 
The Governor- General maintained that the council-room 
was not a proper place for such an investigation ; that 
from persons who were heated by daily conflict with 
him he could not expect the fairness of judges; and 



WABllSN HASTINGS. 59 

that he could not, without betraying the dignity of his 
post, submit to be confronted with such a man as 
Nuncomar. The majority, however, resolved to go 
into the charges. Hastings rose, declared the sitting 
at an end, and left the room, followed by Barwell. 
The other members kept their seats, voted themselves 
a council, put Clavering in the chair, and ordered 
Nuncomar to be called in. Nuncomar not only 
adhered to the original charges, but, after the fashion of 
the East, produced a large supplement. He stated 
that Hastings had received a great sum for appointing 
Rajah Goordas treasurer of the Nabob's household, and 
for commiting the care of his Highness's person to the 
Munny Begum. He put in a letter purporting to bear 
the seal of the Munny Begum, for the purpose of 
establishing the truth of his story. The seal, whether 
forged, as Hastings affirmed, or genuine, as we are 
rather inclined to believe, proved nothing. Nuncomar, 
as everybody knows who knows India, had only to tell 
the Munny Begum that such a letter would give plea- 
sure to the majority of the Council, in order to procure 
her attestation. The majority, however, voted that the 
charge was made out; that Hastings had corruptly 
received between thirty and forty thousand pounds; 
and that he ought to be compelled to refund. 

The general feeling among the English in Bengal 
was strongly in favour of the Governor- General. In 



60 WARREN HASTINGS. 

talents for busiuess, in knowledge of the country, in 
general courtesy of demeanour, he was decidedly 
superior to Ms persecutors. The servants of the Com- 
pany were naturally disposed to side with the most 
distinguished member of their own body against a 
clerk from the War Office, who, profoundly ignorant 
of the native languages and of the native character, 
took on himself to regulate every department of the 
administration. Hastings, however, in spite of the 
general sympathy of his countrymen, was in a most 
painful situation. There was still an appeal to higher 
authority in England. If that authority took part with 
his enemies, nothing was left to him but to throw up 
his office. He accordingly placed his resignation in 
the hands of his agent in London, Colonel Macleane. 
But Macleane was instructed not to produce the resig- 
nation, unless it should be fully ascertained that the 
feeling at the India House was adverse to the Governor- 
General. 

The triumph of Nuncomar seemed to be complete. 
He held a daily levee, to which his countrymen resorted 
in crowds, and to which, on one occasion, the majority 
of the Council condescended to repair. His house was 
an office for the purpose of receiving charges against 
the Governor- General. It was said that, partly by 
threats, and partly by wheedling, the villanous 
Brahmin had induced many of the wealthiest men of 



WAKiiEN HASTINGS. 61 

llie province to send in complaints. But he was 
playing a perilous game. It was not safe to drive to 
despair a man of such resources and of such determina- 
tion as Hastings. Nuncomar, with all his acuteness, 
did not understand the nature of the institutions under 
which he lived. He saw that he had with him the 
majority of tlie body which made treaties, gave places, 
raised taxes. The separation between political and 
judicial functions was a thing of which he had no 
conception. It had probably never occurred to him 
that there was in Bengal an authority perfectly inde- 
pendent of the Council, an authority which could 
protect one whom the Council wished to destroy, and 
send to the gibbet one whom the Council wished to 
protect. Yet such was the fact. The Supreme Court 
was, within the sphere of its own duties, altogether 
independent of the Government. Hastings, with his 
usual sagacity, had seen how much advantage he 
might derive from possessing himself of this strong- 
hold; and he had acted accordingly. The judges, 
especially the Chief Justice, were hostile to the 
majority of the Council. The time had now come for 
putting this formidable machinery into action. 

On a sudden, Calcutta was astounded by the news 
that Nuncomar had been taken up on a charge of 
felony, committed, and thrown into the common gaol. 
The crime imputed to him was that six years before he 



62 WARREN HASTINGS. 

had forged a bond. The ostensible prosecutor was a 
native. But it was then, and still is, the opinion of 
everybody, idiots and biographers excepted, that 
Hastings was the real mover in the business. 

The rage of the majority rose to the highest point. 
They protested against the proceedings of the Supreme 
Court, and sent several urgent messages to the Judges, 
demanding that Nuncomar should be admitted to bail. 
The Judges returned haughty and resolute answers. 
All that the Council could do was to heap honours and 
emoluments on the family of Nuncomar ; and this they 
did. In the meantime the assizes commenced; a true 
bill was found ; and E'uncomar was brought before Sir 
Elijah Impey and a jury composed of Englishmen. A 
great quantity of contradictory swearing, and the 
necessity of having every word of the evidence inter- 
preted, protracted the trial to a most unusual length. 
At last a verdict of guilty was returned, and the Chief 
Justice pronounced sentence of death on the prisoner. 

That Impey ought to have respited Nuncomar we 
hold to be perfectly clear. Whether the whole proceed- 
ing was not illegal, is a question. But it is certain, 
that whatever may have been, according to technical 
rules of construction, the effect of the statute under 
which the trial took place, it was most unjust to hang 
a Hindoo for forgery. The law which made forgery 
capital in England was passed without the smallest 



WARREN HASTINGS. BS 

reference to the state of society in India. It was 
unknown to the natives of India. It had never been 
put in execution among them, certainly not for want of 
delinquents. It was in the highest degree shocking to 
all their notions. They were not accustomed to the 
distinction which many circumstances, peculiar to our 
own state of society, have led us to make between 
lorgery and other kinds of cheating. The counter- 
feiting of a seal was, in their estimation, a common act 
of swindling ; nor had it ever crossed their minds that 
it was to be punished as severely as gang-robbery or 
assassination. A just judge would, beyond all doubt, 
have reserved the case for the consideration of the 
sovereign. But Impey would not hear of mercy or 
delay. 

The excitement among all classes was great. Francis 
and Francis's few English adherents described the 
Governor- General and the Chief Justice as the worst 
of murderers. Olavering, it was said, swore that, even 
at the foot of the gallows, ISTuncomar should be 
rescued. The bulk of the European society, though 
strongly attached to the Governor-General, could not 
but feel compassion for a man who, with all his crimes, 
had so long filled so large a space in their sight, who 
had been great and powerful before the British em- 
pire in India began to exist, and to whom, in the old 
tinges, governors and members of council, then mere 



64 WAHTlETSr HASTINGS. 

eommercial factors, had paid court for protection. The 
feeling of the Hindoos was infinitely stronger. They 
were, indeed, not a people to strike one blow for their 
countryman. But his sentence filled them with sorrow 
and dismay. Tried even by their low standard of 
morality, he was a bad man. But, bad as he was, he 
was the head of their race and religion, a Brahmin of 
the Brahmins. He had inherited the purest and 
highest caste. He had practised with, the greatest 
punctuality all those ceremonies to which the super- 
stitious Bengalees ascribe far more importance than to 
the correct discharge of the social duties. They felt, 
therefore, as a devout Catholic in the dark ages would 
have felt, at seeing a prelate of the highest dignity 
sent to the gallows by a secular tribunal. According 
to their old national laws, a Brahmin could not be put 
to death for any crime whatever. And the crime for 
which Nuncomar was about to die was regarded by 
them in much the same light in which the selling of an 
unsound horse for a sound price is regarded by a 
Yorkshire jockey. 

The Mussulmans alone appear to have seen with 
exultation the fate of the powerful Hindoo, who had 
attempted to rise by means of the ruin of Mahommed 
Reza Khan. The Mahommedan historian of those 
times takes delight in aggravating the charge. He 
assures us that in Nuncon-ar's house a casket was 



WAE,B,S]Sr HASTIN-GS. 65 

found containing counterfeits of the seals of all tke 
richest men of the province. We have never fallen in 
with any other authority for this story, which in itself 
is by no means improbable. 

The day drew near ; and I^uncomar prepared himself 
to die with that quiet fortitude with which the 
Bengalee, so effeminately timid in personal conflict, 
often encounters calamities for which there is no 
remedy. The sheriff, with the humanity which is 
seldom wanting in an English gentleman, visited the 
prisoner on the eve of the execution, and assured him 
that no indulgence consistent with the law should be 
refused to him. Nuncomar expressed his gratitude 
with great politeness and unaltered composure. Not a 
muscle of his face moved. N'ot a sigh broke from him. 
He put his finger to his forehead, and calmly said that 
fate would have its way, and that there was no resist- 
ing the pleasure of God. He sent his compliments to 
Erancis, Clavering, and Monson, and charged them to 
protect Rajah Goordas, who was about to become the 
head of the Brahmins of Bengal. The sheriff with- 
drew, greatly agitated by what had passed, and 
Nuncomar sat composedly down to write notes and 
examine accounts. 

The next morning, before the sun was in his power, 
an immense concourse assembled round the place where 
the gallows had been set up. Grief and horror were 
C— 1 



66 WARREN HASTINGS. 

on every face; yet to the last tlie multitude could 
hardly believe that the English really purposed to take 
the life of the great Brahmin. At length the 
mournful procession came through the crowd. Nun- 
comar sat up in his palanquin, and looked round him 
with unaltered serenity. He had just parted from 
those who were most nearly connected with him. 
Their cries and contortions had appalled the European 
ministers of justice, but had not produced the smallest 
effect on the iron stoicism of the prisoner. The only 
anxiety which he expressed was that men of his own 
priestly caste might be in attendance to take charge of 
his corpse. He again desired to be remembered to his 
friends in the Council, mounted the scaffold with 
firmness, and gave the signal to the executioner. The 
moment that the drop fell, a howl of sorrow and 
despair rose from the innumerable spectators. Hundreds 
turned away their faces from the polluting sight, fled 
with loud wailings towards the Hoogley, and plunged 
into its holy waters, as if to purify themselves from 
the guilt of having looked on such a crime. These 
feelings were not confined to Calcutta. The whole 
province was greatly excited; and the population of 
Dacca, in particular, gave strong signs of grief and 
dismay. 

Of Impey's conduct it is impossible to speak too 
severely. We have already said that, in our opinion. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 67 

he acted unjustly in refusing to resx3ite Kuncomar. 
No rational man can doubt that lie took tids course in 
order to gratify the Governor- General. If we had 
ever had any doubts on that point, they would have 
been dispelled by a letter which Mr. Gleig has 
published. Hastings, three or four years later, 
described Impey as the man "to whose supx3ort he 
was at one time indebted for the safety of his fortune, 
honour, and rexjutation." These strong words can 
refer only to the case of Nuncomar; and they must 
mean that Impey hanged Nuncomar in order to 
support Hastings. It is therefore our deliberate 
opinion that Impey, sitting as a judge, put a man 
unjustly to death in order to serve a political purpose. 

But we look on the conduct of Hastings in a some- 
what different light. He was struggling for fortune, 
honour, liberty, all that makes life valuable. He was 
beset by rancorous and unprincipled enemies. From 
his colleagues he could expect no justice. He cannot 
be blamed for wishing to crush his accusers. He was 
indeed bound to use only legitimate means for that 
end. But it was not strange that he should have 
thought any means legitimate which were pronounced 
legitimate by the sages of the law, by men whose 
peculiar duty it was to deal justly between adversaries, 
and whose education might be supposed to have 
peculiarly qualified them for the discharge of that 



68 WAEEEN HASTINGS. 

duty. Nobody demands from a party tlie unbending 
equity of a judge. The reason that judges are ap- 
pointed is, that even a good man cannot be trusted to 
decide a cause in which he is himself concerned. Not 
a day passes on which an honest prosecutor does not 
ask for what none but a dishonest tribunal woidd 
grant. It is too much to expect that any man, when 
his dearest interests are at stake, and his strongest 
passions excited, will, as against himself, be more just 
than the sworn dispensers of justice. To take an 
analogous case from the history of our own island ; 
suppose that Lord Stafford, when in the Tower on sus- 
picion of being concerned in the Popish plot, had been 
apprised that Titus Gates had done something which 
might, by a questionable construction, be brought 
under the head of felony. Should we severely blame 
Lord Stafford, in the supposed case, for causing a pro- 
secution to be instituted, for furnishing funds, for 
using all his influence to intercept the mercy of the 
Crown? We think not. If a judge, indeed, from 
favour to the Catholic lords, were to strain the law in 
order to hang Gates, such a judge would richly deserve 
impeachment. But it does not appear to us that the 
Catholic lord, by bringing the case before the judge 
for decision, would materially overstep the limits of a 
just self-defence. 

While, therefore, we have not the least doubt that 



WAEEEN HASTINGS. b& 

tMs memorable execution is to be attributed to Hast- 
ings, we doubt whether it can with justice be reckoned 
among his crimes. That his conduct was dictated by a 
profound policy is evident. He was in a minority in 
Council. It was possible that he might long be in a 
minority. He knew the native character well. He 
knew in what abundance accusations are certain to 
flow in against the most innocent inhabitant of India 
who is under the frown of power. There was not in 
the whole black population of Bengal a place-holder, a 
place-hunter, a government tenant, who did not think 
that he might better himself by sending up a deposi- 
tion against the Governor- General. Under these cir- 
cumstances, the persecuted statesman resolved to teach 
the whole crew of accusers and witnesses, that, though 
in a minority at the council-board, he was stiU to be 
feared. The lesson which he gave them was indeed a 
lesson not to be forgotten. The head of the combina- 
tion which had been formed against him, the richest, 
the most powerful, the most artful of the Hindoos, dis- 
tinguished by the favour of those who then held the 
go-s'ernment, fenced round by the superstitious reve- 
rence of millions, was hanged in broad day before many 
thousands of people. Everything that could make the 
warning impressive, dignity in the sufferer, solemnity 
in the proceeding, was found in this case. The help- 
less rage and vain struggles of the Council made the 



70 WARREN HASTINGS. 

triumph more sigual. From that moment the convic- 
tion of every native was that it was safer to take the 
part of Hastings in a minority than that of Francis in 
a majority, and that he who was so venturous as to 
join in running down the Governor- General might 
chance, in the phrase of the Eastern poet, to find a 
tiger while beating the jungle for a deer. The voices 
of a thousand informers were silenced in an instant. 
From that time, whatever difficulties Hastings might 
have to encounter, he was never molested by accusa- 
tions from natives of India. 

It is a remarkable circumstance that one of the 
letters of Hastings to Dr. Johnson bears date a very 
few hours after the death of Nuncomar. While the 
whole settlement was in commotion, while a mighty 
and ancient priesthood were weeping over the remains 
of their chief, the conqueror in that deadly grapple sat 
down, with characteristic self-possession, to write about 
the Tour to the Hebrides, Jones's Persian Grammar, 
and the history, traditions, arts, and natural produc- 
tions of India. 

In the meantime, intelligence of the Rohilla war, 
and of the first disputes between Hastings and his col- 
leagues, had reached London. The Directors took 
part with the majority, and sent out a letter filled with 
severe reflections on the conduct of Hastings. They 
condemned, in strong but just terms, the iniquity of 



WARREN HASTINGS. 71 

midertaking offensive wars merely for tlie sake of 
pecuniary advantage. But they utterly forgot that, if 
Hastings had by illicit means obtained pecuniary ad- 
vantages, he had done so, not for his own benefit, but 
in order to meet their demands. To enjoin honesty, 
and to insist on having what could not be honestly got, 
was then the constant practice of the Company. As 
Lady Macbeth says of her husband, they " would not 
play false, and yet would wrongly win." 

The Regulating Act, by which Hastings had been 
appointed Governor- General for five years, empowered 
the Crown to remove him on an address from the Com- 
pany. Lord North was desirous to procure such an 
address. The three members of Council who had been 
sent out from England were men of his own choice. 
General Clavering, in particular, was supported by a 
large parliamentary connection, such as no cabinet 
could be inclined to disoblige. The wish of the mini- 
ster was to displace Hastings, and to put Clavering at 
the head of the government. In the Court of Directors 
parties were very nearly balanced. Eleven voted 
against Hastings; ten for him. The Court of Pro- 
prietors was then convened. The great sale-room pre- 
sented a singular appearance. Letters had been sent 
by the Secretary of the Treasury, exhorting all the 
supporters of government who held India stock to be 
in attendance. Lord Sandwich marshalled the friends 



72 WARREN HASTINGS. 

of the administration with his usual dexterity and 
alertness. Fifty peers and privy councillors, seldom 
seen so far eastAvard, were counted in the crowd. The 
debate lasted till midnight. The opponents of Hast- 
ings had a small superiority on the division ; but a 
ballot was demanded; and the result was that the 
■Governor- General triumphed by a majority of above a 
hundred votes over the combined efforts of the 
Directors and the Cabinet. The ministers were greatly 
exasperated by this defeat. Even Lord North lost his 
temper, no ordinary occurrence with him, and threat- 
ened to convoke parliament before Christmas, and to 
bring in a bill for depriving the Company of all politi- 
. cal power, and for restricting it to its old business of 
trading in silks and teas. 

Colonel Macl'eane, who through all this conflict had 
zealously supported the cause of Hastings, now 
thought that his employer was in imminent danger of 
being turned out, branded with parliamentary censure, 
perhaps prosecuted. The opinion of the Crown lawyers 
had already been taken respecting some parts of the 
Governor- General's conduct. It seemed to be high 
time to think of securing an honourable retreat. 
Under these circumstances, Macleane thought himseK 
justified in producing the resignation with which he 
had been intrusted. The instrument was not in very 
accurate form; but the Directors were too eager to be 



WAEREN HASTINGS. 73 

scrapulous. They accepted the resignation, fixed on 
Mr. Wheler, one of their own body, to succeed Hast- 
ings, and sent out orders that General Clavering, as 
senior member of Council, should exercise the func- 
tions of Governor- General tiU Mr. Wheler should 
arrive. 

But, while these things were passing in England, a 
great change had taken place in Bengal. Monson was 
no more. Only four members of the government were 
left. Clavering and Francis were on one side, BarweE 
and the Governor- General on the other; and the 
Governor- General had the casting vote. Hastings, 
who had been during two years destitute of all power 
and patronage, became at once absolute. He instantly 
proceeded to retaliate on his adversaries. Their 
measures were reversed : their creatures were dis- 
placed. A new valuation of the lands of Bengal, for 
the purposes of taxation, was ordered ; and it was pro- 
vided that the whole inquiry should be conducted by 
the Governor- General, and that all the letters relating 
to it should run in his name. He began, at the same 
time, to revolve vast plans of conquest and dominion, 
plans which he lived to see realised, though not by 
himseK. His project was to form subsidiary alliances 
with the native princes, particularly with those of Oude 
and Berar, and thus to make Britain the paramount 
power in India. "While he was meditating these great 



74 WARREN HASTINGS. 

designs, arrived the intelligence that he had ceased to 
be Governor- General, that his resignation had been 
accepted, that Wheler was coming out immediately, 
and that, till "Wheler arrived, the chair was to be filled 
by Clavering. 

Had Hastings still been in a minority, he would 
probably have retired without a struggle ; but he was 
now the real master of British India, and he was not 
disposed to quit his high place. He asserted that he 
had never given any instructions which could warrant 
the steps taken at home. Yv'hat his instructions had 
been, he owned he had forgotten. If he had kept a 
copy of them, he had mislaid it. But he was certain 
that he had repeatedly declared to the Directors that 
he would not resign. He could not see how the court, 
possessed of that declaration from himseK, could re- 
ceive his resignation from the doubtful hands of an 
agent. If the resignation were invalid, all the pro- 
ceedings which were founded on that resignation were 
null, and Hastings was still Governor- General. 

He afterwards affirmed that, though his agents had 
not acted in conformity with his instructions, he 
would, nevertheless, have held himself bound by their 
acts, if Clavering had not attempted to seize the 
supreme power by violence. Whether this assertion 
were or were not true, it cannot be doubted that the 
imprudence of Clavering gave Hastings an advantage. 



WARRSN HASTINGS. 75 

The General sent for the keys of the fort and of the 
treasury, took possession of the records, and held a 
council at which Francis attended. Hastings took the 
chair in another apartment, and Barwell sat with him. 
Each of the two parties had a plausible show of right. 
There was no authority entitled to their obedience 
within fifteen thousand miles. It seemed that there 
remained no way of settling the dispute except an 
appeal to arms ; and from such an appeal, Hastings, 
confident of his influence over his countrymen in India, 
was not inclined to shrink. He directed the officers of 
the garrison at Fort William, and of all the neigh- 
bouring stations, to obey no orders but his. At the 
same time, with admirable judgment, he offered to 
submit the case to the Supreme Court, and to abide by 
its decision. By making this proposition he risked 
nothing ; yet it was a proposition which his opponents 
could hardly reject. Nobody could be treated as a 
criminal for obeying what the judges should solemnly 
pronounce to be the lawful government. The boldest 
man would shrink from taking arms in defence of 
what the judges should pronounce to be usurpation. 
Clavering and Francis, after some delay, unwillingly 
consented to abide by the award of the court. The 
court pronounced that the resignation was invalid, and 
that therefore Hastings was still Governor- General 
under the Regulating Act ; and the defeated members 



7<5 WAKREN HASTINGS. i 

of the Council, finding that the sense of the whole 
settlement was against them, acquiesced in the de- 
cision. 

About this time arrived the news that, after a suit 
which had lasted several years, the Franconian courts 
had decreed a divorce between Imhoff and his wife. 
The Baron left Calcutta, carrying with him the means 
of buying an estate in Saxony. The lady became Mrs. 
Hastings. The event was celebrated by great 
festivities; and all the most conspicuous persons of 
Calcutta, without distinction of parties, were invited 
to the Government-house. Clavering, as the Mahom- 
medan chronicler tells the story, was sick in mind and 
body, and excused himseK from joining the splendid 
assembly. But Hastings, whom, as it should seem, 
success in ambition and in love had put into high 
good-humour, would take no denial. He went himself 
to the G-eneral's house, and at length brought his van- 
quished rival in triumph to the gay circle which sur- 
rounded the bride. The exertion was too much for a 
frame broken by mortification as well as by disease. 
Clavering died a few days later. 

Wheler, who came out expecting to be Governor- 
General and was forced to content himseK with a seat 
at the council-board, generally voted with Francis. 
But the Governor- General, with Barwell's help and 
his own casting vote, was still the master. Some 



WARREN HASTINGS. 77 

change took place at tliis time, in tlie feeling both of 
the Court of Directors and of the Ministers of the 
Crown. All designs against Hastings were dropped ; 
and, when his origincil term of five years expired, he 
was quietly reappointed. The truth is, that the fearful 
dangers to which the public interests in every quarter 
were now exposed, made both Lord North and the 
Company unwilling to part with a Governor whose 
talents, experience, and resolution, enmity itself was 
compelled to acknowledge. 

The crisis was indeed formidable. That great and 
victorious empire, on the throne of which George the 
Third had taken his seat eighteen years before, with 
brighter hopes than had attended the accession of any 
of the long line of English sovereigns, had, by the 
most senseless misgoverument, been brought to the 
verge of ruin. In America, millions of Englishmen 
were at war with the country from which their blood, 
their language, their religion, and their institutions 
were derived, and to which, but a short time before, 
they had been as strongly attached as the inhabitants 
of Norfolk and Leicestershire. The great powers of 
Europe, humbled to the dust by the vigour and genius 
which had guided the councils of George the Second, 
now rejoiced in the prospect of a signal revenge. The 
time was approaching when our Island, while 
struggling to keep down the United States of America, 



78 WARREN HASTINGS. 

and pressed with, a still nearer danger by the too just 
discontents of Ireland, was to be assailed by France, 
Spain, and Holland, and to be threatened by the 
armed neutrality of the Baltic ; when even our mari- 
time supremacy was to be in jeopardy ; when hostile 
fleets were to command the Straits of Calpe and the 
Mexican Sea ; when the British flag was to be scarcely 
able to protect the British Channel. Great as were 
the faults of Hastings, it was happy for our country 
that at that conjuncture, the most terrible through 
which she has ever passed, he was the ruler of her 
Indian dominions. 

An attack by sea on Bengal was little to be appre- 
hended. The danger was that the European enemies 
of England might form an alliance with some native 
power, might furnish that power with troops, arms, 
and ammunition, and might thus assail our possessions 
on the side of the land. It was chiefly from the 
Maihrattas that Hastings anticipated danger. The 
original seat of that singular people was the wild 
range of hills which runs along the western coast of 
India. In the reign of Aurungzebe, the inhabitants of 
those regions, led by the great Sevajee, began to de- 
scend on the possessions of their wealthier and less 
warlike neighbours. The energy, ferocity, and 
cunning of the Mahrattas soon made them the most 
conspicuous among the new powers which were 



WAEEEN HASTINGS. 79 

generated by tlie corruption of the decaying monarchy. 
At first they were only robbers. They soon rose to 
the dignity of conquerors. Half the provinces of the 
empire were turned into Mahratta principalities. 
Freebooters, sprung from low castes, and accustomed 
to menial employments, became mighty E/ajahs. The 
Bonslas, at the head of a band of plunderers, occupied 
the vast region of Berar. The G-uicowar, which is, 
being interpreted, the Herdsman, founded that dynasty 
which still reigns in G-uzerat. The houses of Scindia 
and Holkar waxed great in Malwa. One adventurous 
captain made his nest on the impregnable rock of 
Gooti. Another became the lord of the thousand 
villages which are scattered among the green rice- 
fields of Tan j ore. 

That was the time throughout India of double 
government. The form and the power were every- 
where separated. The Mussulman !N'abobs who had 
become sovereign princes, the Yizier in Oude, and the 
Nizam at Hyderabad, still called themselves the viceroys 
of the house of Tamerlane. In the same manner the 
Mahratta states, though really independent of each 
other, pretended to be members of one empire. They 
all acknowledged, by words and ceremonies, the supre- 
macy of the heir of Sevajee, a roi faineant, who 
chewed bang and toyed with dancing girls in a state 
prison at Sattara, and of his Peshwa or mayor of the 



80 WARREN HASTINGS. 

palace, a great hereditary magistrate, who kept a 
court with kingly state at Poonah, and whose 
authority was obeyed in the spacious provinces of 
Aurungabad and Bejapoor. 

Some months before war was declared in Europe 
the government of Bengal was alarmed by the news 
that a French adventurer, who passed for a man of 
quality, had arrived at Poonah. It was said that he 
had been received there with great distinction, that he 
had delivered to the Peshwa letters and presents from 
Louis the Sixteenth, and that a treaty, hostile to 
England, had been concluded between France and the 
Mahrattas. 

Hastings immediately resolved to strike the first 
blow. The title of the Peshwa was not undisputed. 
A portion of the Mahratta nation was favourable to a 
pretender. The Governor- General determined to es- 
pouse this pretender's interest, to move an army across 
the peninsula of India, and to form a close alliance 
with the chief of the house of Bonsla, who ruled Berar, 
and who, in power and dignity, was inferior to none of 
the Mahratta princes. 

The army had marched, and the negotiations with 
Berar were in progress, when a letter from the English 
consul at Cairo brought the news that war had been 
proclaimed both in London and Paris. All the 
measures which the crisis required were adopted by 



WARREN HASTINGS. 81 

Hastings without a moment's delay. The French 
factories in Bengal were seized. Orders were sent to 
Madras that Pondicherry should instantly he occupied. 
Near Calcutta works were thrown up which were 
thought to render the approach of a hostile force im- 
possible. A maritime establishment was formed for 
the defence of the river. Nine new battalions of 
sepoys were raised, and a corps of native artillery was 
formied out of the hardy Lascars of the Bay of Bengal. 
Having made these arrangements, the Governor- 
General, with calm confidence, pronounced his presi- 
dency secure from all attack, unless the Mahrattas 
should march against it in conjunction with the 
French. 

The expedition which Hastings had sent westward 
was not so speedily or completely successful as most o-f 
his undertakings. The commanding officer procrasti- 
nated. The authorities at Bombay blundered. But 
the Governor- General persevered. A new commander 
repaired the errors of his predecessor. Several brilliant 
actions spread the military renown of the English 
through regions where no European flag had ever been 
seen. It is probable that, if a new and more formidable 
danger had not compelled Hastings to change his 
whole policy, his plans respecting the Mahratta em- 
pire would have been carried into complete effect. 

The authorities in England had wisely sent out to 



82 WAHREN HASTINGS. 

Bengal, as commander of tlie forces and member of the 
Council, one of the most distinguished soldiers of that 
time. Sir Eyre Coote had, many years before, been 
conspicuous among the founders of the British empire 
in the East. At the council of war which preceded 
the battle of Plassey, he earnestly recommended, in 
opposition to the majority, that daring course which, 
after some hesitation, was adopted, and which was 
crowned with such splendid success. He subsequently 
commanded in the south of India against the brave and 
unfortunate Lally, gained the decisive battle of Wande- 
wash over the French and their native allies, took 
Pondicherry, and made the English power supreme in 
the Carnatic. Since these great exploits near twenty 
years had elapsed. Coote had no longer the bodily 
activity which he had shown in earlier days ; nor was 
the vigour of his mind altogether unimpaired. He 
was capricious and fretful, and required much coaxing 
to keep him in good humour. It must, we fear, be 
added that the love of money had grown upon him, and 
that he thought more about his allowances, and less 
about his duties, than might have been expected from 
60 eminent a member of so noble a profession. Still 
he was perhaps the ablest officer that was then to be 
found in the British army. Among the native soldiers 
his name was great and his influence unrivalled. ISTor 
is he yet forgotten by them. Now and then a white- 



WARREN HASTINGS. 83 

bearded old sepoy may still be found who loves to talk 
of Porto Novo and Pollilore. It is but a short time 
since one of those aged men came to present a memorial 
to an English officer, who holds one of the highest 
employments in India. A print of Coote hung in the 
room. The veteran recognised at once that face and 
figure which he had not seen for more than half a 
century, and, forgetting his salaam to the living, halted, 
drew himself up, lifted his hand, and with solemn 
reverence paid his military obeisance to the dead. 

Coote, though he did not, like Barwell, vote con- 
stantly with the Governor- General, was by no means 
inclined to join in systematic opposition, and on most 
questions concurred with Hastings, who did his best, 
by assiduous courtship, and. by readily granting the 
most exorbitant allowances, to gratify the strongest 
passions of the old soldier. 

It seemed likely at this time that a general recon- 
ciliation would put an end to the quarrels which had, 
during some years, weakened and disgraced the 
government of Bengal. The dangers of the empire 
might well induce men of patriotic feeling (and of 
patriotic feeling neither Hastings nor Francis was 
destitute) to forget private enmities and to co-operate 
heartily for the general good. Coote had never been 
concerned in faction. Wheler was thoroughly tired of 
it. Bai-well had made an ample fortune, and, though 



84 WAEREN HASTINGS. 

he had. promised that be would not leave Calcutta 
while his help was needed in Council, was most de- 
sirous to return to England, and exerted himself to 
promote an arrangement which would set him at 
iiherty. 

A compact was made, by which Francis agreed to 
desist from opposition, and Hastings engaged that the 
friends of Francis should be admitted to a fair share of 
the honours and emoluments of the service. During a 
few months after this treaty there was apparent 
harmony at the council-board. 

Harmony, indeed, was never more necessary ; for at 
this moment internal calamities, more formidable than 
war itself, menaced Bengal. The authors of the 
Regulating Act of 1773 had established two inde- 
pendent powers, the one judicial, and the other poli- 
tical ; and, with a carelessness scandalously common in 
English legislation, had omitted to define the limits of 
either. The judges took advantage of the indistinct- 
ness, and attempted to draw to themselves supreme 
authority, not only within Calcutta, but through the 
whole of the great territory subject to the Presidency 
of Fort William. There are few Englishmen who will 
not admit that the English law, in spite of modern 
improvements, is neither so cheap nor so speedy as 
might be wished. Still, it is a system which has 
grown up among us. In some points it has been 



WARREN HASTINGS. 85 

fashioned to suit our feelings ; in others, it has gra- 
dually fashioned our feelings to suit itself. Even to its 
worst evils we are accustomed ; and therefore, though 
we may complain of them, they do not strike us with 
the horror and dismay which would be produced by a 
new grievance of smaller severity. In India the case 
is widely different. English law, transplanted to that 
country, has all the vices from which we suffer here ; 
it has them aU in a far higher degree ; and it has other 
vices, compared with which the worst vices from which 
we suffer are trifles. Dilatory here, it is far more 
dilatory in a land where the help of an interpreter is 
needed by every judge and by every advocate. Costly 
here, it is far more costly in a land into which the 
legal practitioners must be imported from an immense 
distance. All English labour in India, from the labour 
of the Governor- G-eneral and the Commander-in-Chief, 
down to that of a groom or a watchmaker, must be paid 
for at a higher rate than at home. 'No man will be 
banished, and banished to the torrid zone, for nothing. 
The rule holds good with respect to the legal pro- 
fession. No English barrister wiU work, fifteen 
thousand miles from all his friends, with the ther- 
mometer at ninety-six in the shade, for the emoluments 
which will content him in chambers that overlook the 
Thames. Accordingly, the fees at Calcutta are about 
three times as great as the fees of Westminster HaU; 



8b WARREK KASTIKaS. 

and this, thongli the people of India are, beyond all 
comparison, poorer than the people of England. Yet 
the delay and the expense, grievous as they are, form 
the smallest part of the evil which English law, im- 
ported without modifications into India, could not fail 
to produce. The strongest feelings of our nature, 
honour, religion, female modesty, rose up against the 
innovation. Arrest on mesne process was the first 
step in most civil proceedings ; and to a native of rank 
arrest was not merely a restraint, but a foul personal 
indignity. Oaths were required in every stage of 
every suit ; and the feeling of a Quaker about an oath 
is hardly stronger than that of a respectable native. 
That the apartments of a woman of quality should be 
entered by strange men, or that her face should be seen 
by them, are, in the East, intolerable outrages, out- 
rages which are more dreaded than death, and which 
can be expiated only by the shedding of blood. To 
these outrages the most distinguished families of 
Bengal, Bahar, and Orissa were now exposed. Imagine 
what the state of our own country would be, if a juris- 
prudence were on a sudden introduced among us, which 
should be to us what our jurisprudence was to our 
Asiatic subjects. Imagine what the state of our 
country would be, if it were enacted that any man, by 
merely swearing that a debt was due to him, should 
acquire a right to insult the persons of men of the 



W\RRKN i{A.STT?:as. 87 

most honourable aud sacred callings, and of women of 
the most shrinking delicacy, to horsewhip a general 
officer, to put a bishop in the stocks, to treat ladies in 
a way which called forth the blow of Wat Tyler. 
Something like this was the effect of the attempt 
which the Supreme Court made to extend its juris- 
diction over the whole of the Company's territory. 

A reign of terror began, of terror heightened by 
mystery ; for even that which was endured was less 
horrible than that which was anticipated. No man 
knew what was next to be expected from this strange 
tribunal. It came from beyond the black water, 
as the people of India, with mysterious horror, 
caU the sea. It consisted of judges not one of whom 
was familiar with the usages of the millions over whom 
they claimed boundless authority. Its records were 
kept in unknown characters ; its sentences were pro- 
nounced in unknown sounds. It had already collected 
round itself an army of the worst part of the native 
population, informers, and false witnesses, and common 
barrators, and agents of chicane, and above all, a 
banditti of bailiff's followers, compared with whom the 
retainers of the worst English sponging-houses, in the 
worst times, might be considered as upright and tender- 
hearted. Many natives, highly considered among 
their countrymen, were seized, hurried up to Calcutta, 
flung into the common gaol, not- for any crime even 



88 WARREN HASTINGS. 

imputed, not for any debt that had been proved, but 
merely as a precaution till their cause should come to 
trial. There were instances in which men of the most 
venerable dignity, persecuted without a cause by 
extortioners, died of rage and shame in the gripe of the 
vile alguazils of Impey. The harems of noble Mahom- 
medans, sanctuaries respected in the East by govern- 
ments which respected nothing else, were burst open 
by gangs of bailiffs. The Mussulmans, braver and less 
accustomed to submission than the Hindoos, sometimes 
stood on their defence; and there were instances in 
which they shed their blood in the doorway, while 
defending, sword in hand, the sacred apartments of 
their women. Nay, it seemed as if even the faint- 
hearted Bengalee, who had crouched at the feet of 
Surajah Dowlah, who had been mute during the 
administration of Yansittart, would at length j&nd 
courage in despair. No Mahratta invasion had ever 
spread through the province such dismay as this inroad 
of English lawyers. All the injustice of former 
oppressors, Asiatic and European, appeared as a 
blessing when compared with the justice of the 
Supreme Court. 

Every class of the population, English and native, 
with the exception of the ravenous pettifoggers who 
fattened on the misery and terror of an immense com- 
munity, cried out loudly against this fearful oppression. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 89 

But the judges were immovable. If a bailiff was 
resisted, they ordered the soldiers to be called out. If 
a servant of the Company, in conformity with the 
orders of the government, withstood the miserable 
catchpoles who, with Impey's writs in their hands, 
exceeded the insolence and rapacity of gang-robbers, 
he was flung into prison for a contempt. The lapse of 
sixty years, the virtue and wisdom of many eminent 
magistrates who have during that time administered 
justice in the Supreme Court, have not effaced from 
the minds of the people of Bengal the recollection of 
those evil days. 

The members of the government were, on this 
subject, united as one man. Hastings had courted the 
judges ; he had found them useful instruments ; but he 
was not disposed to make them his own masters, or the 
masters of India. His mind was large ; his knowledge 
of the native character most accurate. He saw that 
the system pursued by the Supreme Court was de- 
grading to the government and ruinous to the people ; 
and he resolved to oppose it manfully. The conse- 
quence was, that the friendship, if that be the proper 
word for such a connection, which had existed between 
him and Impey was for a time completely dissolved. 
The government placed itself firmly between the 
tyrannical tribunal and the people. The Chief Justice 
proceeded to the wildest excesses. The Governor- 



90 WAEKEN HASTINGS. 

General and all the members of Council were 
served witli writs, calling on them to appear before 
the King's justices, and to answer for their public 
acts. This was too much. Hastings, with just scorn, 
refused to obey the call, set at liberty the persons 
wrongfully detained by the Court, and took measures 
for resisting the outrageous proceedings of the sheriff's 
officers, if necessary, by the sword. But he had in 
view another device, which might prevent the necessity 
of an appeal to arms. He was seldom at a loss for an 
expedient ; and he knew Impey well. The expedient, 
in this case, was a very simple one, neither more nor 
less than a bribe. Impey was, by act of parliament, 
a judge, independent of the government of Bengal, 
and entitled to a salary of eight thousand a year. 
Hastings proposed to make him also a judge in 
the Company's service, removable at the pleasure of 
the government of Bengal; and to give him, in 
that capacity, about eight thousand a year more. 
It was understood that, in consideration of this 
new salary, Impey would desist from urging the 
high pretensions of his court. If he did urge these 
pretensions, the government could, at a moment's 
notice, eject him from the new place which had been 
created for him. The bargain was struck ; Bengal was 
saved ; an appeal to force was averted ; and the Chief 
Justice was rich, quiet, and infamous. 



WAIIREN HASTINGS. 91 

Of Impey's conduct it is unnecessary to speak. It 
was of a piece with almost every part of his conduct 
that comes under the notice of history. No other such 
judge has dishonoured the English ermine, since 
Jefferies drank himself to death in the Tower. But 
we cannot agree with those who have blamed Hastings 
for this transaction. The case stood thus. The negli- 
gent manner in which the E-egulating Act had been 
framed put it in the power of the Chief Justice to 
throw a great country into the most dreadful confusion. 
He was determined to use his power to the utmost, 
unless he was paid to be still ; and Hastings consented 
to pay him. The necessity was to be deplored. It is 
also to be deplored that pirates should be able to exact 
ransom, by threatening to make their captives walk 
the plank. But to ransom a captive from pirates has 
always been held a humane and Christian act ; and it 
would be absurd to charge the payer of the ransom 
with corrupting the virtue of the corsair. This, we 
seriously think, is a not unfair illustration of the 
relative position of Impey, Hastings, and the people of 
India. Whether it was right in Impey to demand or 
to accept a price for powers which, if they really 
belonged to him, he could not abdicate, which, if they 
did not belong to him, he ought never to have usurped, 
and which in neither case he could honestly sell, is one 
question. It is quite another question whether Hastings 



92 WARREN HASTINGS. 

was not rigM to give any sum, however large, to any 
man, however worthless, rather than either surrender 
millions of human beings to pillage, or rescue them by 
civil war. 

Francis strongly opposed this arrangement. It may, 
indeed, be suspected that personal aversion to Impe'y 
was as strong a motive with Francis as regard for 
the welfare of the province. To a mind burning with 
resentment, it might seem better to leave Bengal to the 
oppressors than to redeem it by enriching them. It is 
not improbable, on the other hand, that Hastings 
may have been the more willing to resort to an ex- 
pedient agreeable to the Chief Justice, because that 
high functionary had already been so serviceable, and 
might, when existing dissensions were composed, be 
serviceable again. 

But it was not on this point alone that Francis was 
now opposed to Hastings. The peace between them 
proved to be only a short and hoUow truce, during 
which their mutual aversion was constantly becoming 
stronger. At length an explosion took place. Hastings 
publicly charged Francis with having deceived him, 
and with having induced Barwell to quit the service 
by insincere promises. Then came a dispute, such as fre- 
quently arises even between honourable men, when they 
may make important agreements by mere verbal com- 
munication. An impartial historian will probably be 



WAEEEN HASTINGS. 93 

of opinion that they had misunderstood each other ; 
but their minds were so much embittered that they 
imputed to each other nothing less than deliberate 
villany. "I do not," said Hastings, in a minute 
recorded on the Consultations of the Government, " I 
do not trust to Mr. Francis's promises of candour, con- 
vinced that he is incapable of it. I judge of his public 
conduct by his private, which I have found to be void 
of truth and honour." After the Council had risen, 
Francis put a challenge into the Governor-General's 
hand. It was instantly accepted. They met, and fired. 
Francis was shot through the body. He was carried to 
a neighbouring house, where it appeared that the wound, 
though severe, was not mortal. Hastings inquired 
repeatedly after his enemy's health, and proposed to 
call on him ; but Francis coldly declined the visit. He 
had a proper sense, he said, of the Governor-General's 
politeness, but could not consent to any private inter- 
view. They could meet only at the Council Board. 

In a very short time it was made signally manifest 
to how great a danger the Governor- General had, on 
this occasion, exposed his country. A crisis arrived 
with which he, and he alone, was competent to deal. 
It is not too much to say that, if he had been taken 
from the head of affairs, the years 1780 and 1781 
would have been as fatal to our power in Asia as to 
our power in America. 



94 WARREN HASTINGS. 

The Mahrattas had been tlie chief objects of appre- 
hension to Hastings. The measures which he had 
adopted for the purpose of breaking their power had 
at first been frustrated by the errors of those whom 
he was compelled to employ ; but his perseverance and 
ability seemed likely to be crowned with success, when 
a far more formidable danger showed itself in a distant 
quarter. 

About thirty years before this time, a Mahommedan 
soldier had begun to distinguish himself in the wars of 
Southern India. His education had been neglected; 
his extraction was humble. His father had been a 
petty officer of revenue ; his grandfather a wandering 
dervise. But though thus meanly descended, though 
ignorant even of the alphabet, the adventurer had no 
sooner been placed at the head of a body of troops than 
he approved himseK a man born for conquest and com- 
mand. Among the crowd of chiefs who were 
struggling for a share of India, none could compare 
with him in the qualities of the captain and the states- 
man. He became a general ; he became a sovereign. 
Out of the fragments of old principalities, which had 
gone to pieces in the general wreck, he formed for 
himself a great, compact, and vigorous empire. That 
empire he ruled with the ability, severity, and vigilance 
of Lewis the Eleventh. Licentious in his pleasures, 
implacable in his revenge, he had yet enlargement of 



WARREN HASTINGS. 95 

mind enough to perceive how much the prosperity of 
subjects adds to the strength of governments. He 
was an oppressor ; but he had at least the merit of pro- 
tecting his people against all oppression except his 
own. He was now in extreme old age ; but his intel- 
lect was as clear, and his spirit as high, as in the prime 
of manhood. Such was the great Hyder Ali, the 
founder of the Mahommedan kingdom of Mysore, and 
the most formidable enemy with whom the English 
conquerors of India have ever had to contend. 

Had Hastings been governor of Madras, Hyder 
would have been either made a friend, or vigorously 
encountered as an enemy. Unhappily the English 
authorities in the south provoked their powerf ul*neigh- 
bour's hostility, without being prepared to repel it. 
On a sudden, an army of ninety thousand men, far 
superior in discipline and efficiency to any other native 
force that could be found in India, came pouring 
through those wild passes which, worn by mountain 
torrents, and dark with jungle, led down from the 
table-land of Mysore to the plains of the Carnatie. 
This great army was accompanied by a hundred pieces 
of cannon ; and its movements were guided by many 
French officers, trained in the best military schools of 
Europe. 

Hyder was everywhere triumphant. The sepoys in 
many British garrisons flung down their arms. Some 



v'o wAr.sr;:^T hastiistgs. 

forts were surrendered by treachery, and some by 
despair. In a few days tbe wbole open country north 
of the Coleroon had submitted. The English inhabi- 
tants of Madras could already see by night, from the 
top of Mount St. Thomas, the eastern sky reddened by 
a vast semicircle of blazing villages. The white villas, 
to which our countrymen retire after the daily labours 
of Government and of trade, when the cool. evening 
breeze springs up from the bay, were now left without 
inhabitants; for bands of the fierce horsemen of 
Mysore had already been seen prowling among the 
tulip-trees, and near the gay verandahs. Even the 
town was not thought secure, and the British mer- 
chants and public functionaries made haste to crowd 
themselves behind the cannon of fort St, George. 

There were the means, indeed, of assembling an army 
which might have defended the presidency, and even 
driven the invader back to his mountains. Sir Hector 
Munro was at the head of one considerable force; 
IBaillie was advancing with another. United, they 
might have presented a formidable front even to 
such an enemy as Hyder. But the English com- 
manders, neglecting those fundamental rules of the 
military art of which the propriety is obvious even to 
men who have never received a military education, de- 
ferred their junction, and were separately attacked. 
Baillie's detachment was destroyed. Munro was forced 



WAEREX HASTINGS. 97 

to abandon liis baggage, to fling Lis guns into the 
tanks, and to save himself bj a retreat which might be 
called a flight. In three weeks from the commence- 
ment of the war, the British empire in Southern India 
had been brought to the verge of ruin. Only a few 
fortified places remained to us. The glory of our arms 
had departed. It was known that a great French ex- 
pedition might soon be expected on the coast of Coro- 
mandel. England, beset by enemies on every side, 
was in no condition to protect such remote depen- 
dencies. 

Then it was that the fertile genius and serene 
courage of Hastings achieved their most signal 
triumph. A swift ship, flying before the south-west 
monsoon, brought the evil tidings in few days to Cal- 
cutta. In twenty-four hours the Governor- General had 
framed a complete plan of policy adapted to the altered 
state of affairs. The struggle with Hyder was a 
struggle for life and death. All minor objects must 
be sacrificed to the preservation of the Carnatic. The 
disputes with the Mahrattas must be accommodated. A 
large military force and a supply of money must be 
instantly sent to Madras. But even these measures 
would be insufficient, unless the war, hitherto so 
grossly mismanaged, were placed under the direction 
of a vigorous mind. It was no time for trifling. 
Hastings determined to resort to an extreme exer<;ise 
D— 1 



98 WARREN HASTINGS. 

of power, to suspend tlie incapable governor of Fort St. 
George, to send Sir Eyre Coote to oppose Hyder, and 
to intrust that distinguished general with the whole 
administration of the war. 

In spite of the sullen opposition of Francis, who had 
now recoTered from his \iround, and had returned to 
the council, the Govenor-General's wise and firm 
policy was approved by the majority of the board. 
The reinforcements were sent off with great expedition, 
and reached Madras before the French armament ar- 
rived in the Indian seas. Coote, broken by age and 
disease, was no longer the Coote of Wandewash ; but 
he was still a resolute and skilful commander. The 
progress of Hyder was arrested ; and in a few months 
the great victory of Porto Novo retrieved the honour 
of the English arms. 

In the meantime Francis had returned to England, 
and Hastings was now left perfectly unfettered. 
Wheler had gradually been relaxing in his opposition, 
and, after the departure of his vehement and impla- 
cable colleague, co-operated heartily with the Governor- 
General, whose influence over the British in India, 
always great, had, by the vigour and success of his 
recent measures, been considerably increased. 

But, though the difficulties arising from factions 
within the Council were at an end, another class of 
difficulties had become more pressing than ever. The 



WARREN HASTINGS. 99 

financial embarrassmeut was extreme. Hastings had 
to jBud the means, not only of carrying on the govern- 
ment of Bengal, but of maintaining a most costly war 
against both Indian and European enemies in the Car- 
natic, and of making remittances to England. A few 
years before this time he had obtained relief by 
plundering the Mogul and enslaving the E/ohillas ; nor 
were the resources of his fruitful mind by any means 
exhausted. 

His first design was on Benares, a city which in 
wealth, population, dignity, and sanctity, was among 
the foremost of Asia. It was commonly believed 
that haK a million of human beings was crowded into 
that labyrinth of lofty alleys, rich with shrines, and 
minarets, and balconies, and carved oriels, to which 
the sacred apes clung by hundreds. The traveller 
could scarcely make his way through the press of holy 
mendicants and not less holy bulls. The broad and 
stately flights of steps which descended from these 
swarming haunts to the bathing-places along the 
Ganges were worn every day by the footsteps of an 
innumerable multitude of worshippers. The schools 
and temples drew, crowds of pious Hindoos from every 
province where the Brahminical faith was known. 
Hundreds of devotees came thither every month to 
die : for it was believed that a peculiarly happy fate 
awaited the man who should pass from the sacred city 



100 WAEEEN HASTINGS. 

into the sacred river. ITor was superstition the 
only motiTG whicli allured strangers to that great 
metropolis. Commerce had as many pilgrims as 
religion. All along the shores of the venerable stream 
lay great fleets of vessels laden with rich merchandise. 
From the looms of Benares went forth the most 
delicate silks that adorned the balls of St. James's and 
of Yersailles ; and in the bazaars, the muslins of 
Bengal and the sabres of Oude were mingled with 
the Jewels of G-olconda and the shawls of Cashmere. 
This rich capital, and the surrounding tract, had long 
been under the immediate rule of a Hindoo prince, 
who rendered homage to the Mogul emperors. During 
the gre&t anarchy of India, the lords of Benares 
became independent of the court of Delhi, but were 
compelled to submit to the authority of the Nabob of 
Oude. Oppressed by this formidable neighbour, they 
invoked the protection of the English. The English 
protection was given ; and at length the Nabob 
Vizier, by a solemn treaty, ceded all his rights over 
Benares to the Company. From that time the Rajah 
was the vassal of the Government of Bengal, acknow- 
ledged its supremacy, and engaged to send an annual 
tribute to Fort "William. This tribute Cheyte Sing, 
the reigning prince, had paid with strict punctuality. 

About the precise nature of the legal relation be- 
tween the Company and the Rajah of Benares there 



WAHEEN HASTINGS. 101 

has been mucli warm and acute controversy. On the 
one side, it has been maintained that Cheyte Sing 
was merely a great subject on whom the superior 
power had a right to call for aid in the necessities of 
the empire. On the other side, it kis been contended 
that he was an independent prince, that the only claim 
which the Company had u]3on him was for a fixed 
tribute, and that, while the fixed tribute was regularly 
paid, as it assuredly was, the English had no more 
right to exact any further contribution from him than 
to demand subsidies from Holland or Denmark. 
Nothing is easier than to find precedents and analogies 
in favour of either view. 

Our own impression is that neither view is correct. 
It was too much the habit of English politicians to take 
it for granted that there was in India a known and 
definite constitution, by which questions of this kind 
were to be decided. The truth is that, during the 
interval which elapsed between the fall of the house of 
Tamerlane and the establishment of the British 
ascendancy, there was no such constitution. The old 
order of things had passed away ; the new order of 
things was not yet formed. All was transition, con- 
fusion, obscurity. Everybody kept his head as ha 
best might, and scrambled for whatever ho could get. 
There have been similar seasons in Europe. The time 
of the dissolution of the Carlovingian empire is an 



102 WARREN HASTINGS. 

instance. Wlio would tMnk of seriously discussing 
tlie question, wliat extent of pecuniary aid and .of 
obedience Hugh Capet liad a constitutional right to 
demand from the Duke of Brittany or the Duke of 
Normandy? The words "constitutional right" had, 
in that state of society, no meaning. If Hugh Capet 
laid hands on all the possessions of the Duke of 
Normandy, this might be unjust and immoral ; but it 
would not be illegal in the sense in which the ordi- 
nances of Charles the Tenth were illegal. If, on the 
other hand, the Duke of Normandy made war on Hugh 
Capet, this might be unjust and immoral; but it 
would not be illegal in the sense in which the expedi- 
tion of Prince Louis Bonaparte was illegal. 

Yery similar to this was the state of India sixty 
years ago. Of the existing governments not a single 
one could lay claim to legitimacy, or could plead any 
other title than recent occupation. There was scarcely 
a province in which the real sovereignty and the 
^ nominal sovereignty were not disjoined. Titles and 
forms were still retained, which implied that the heir 
of Tamerlane was an absolute ruler, and that the 
Nabobs of the provinces were his lieutenants. In 
reality, he was a captive. The Nabobs were in some 
places independent princes. In other places, as in 
Bengal and the Carnatic, they had, like their master, 
become mere phantoms, and the Company was supreme. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 103 

Among the Makrattas, again, the heir of Sevajee still 
kept the title of Rajah ; but he was a prisoner, and 
his prime minister, the Peshwa, had become the 
hereditary chief of the state. The Peshwa, in his 
turn, was fast sinking into the same degraded situation 
into which he had reduced the E-ajah. It was, we 
believe, impossible to find, from the Himalayas to 
Mysore, a single government which was at once a 
government de facto and a government de jure, which 
possessed the physical means of making itseK feared 
by its neighbours and subjects, and which had at the 
same time the authority derived from law and long 
prescription. 

Hastings clearly discerned what was hidden from 
most of his contemporaries, that such a state of things 
gave immense advantages to a ruler of great talents 
and few scruples. In every international question 
that could arise, he had his option between the de facto 
ground and the de jure ground ; and the probability 
was that one of those gro'^inds would sustain any claim 
that it might be convenient for him to make, and 
enable him to resist any claim made by others. In 
every controversy, accordingly, he resorted to the plea 
which suited his immediate purpose, without troubling 
himseK in the least about consistency; and thus ha 
scarcely ever failed to find what, to persons of short 
memories and scanty information, seemed to be ? 



104 WARREN- HASTINGS. 

justification for wliat lie wanted to do. Sometimes 
the Nabob of Bengal is a shadow, sometimes a 
monarch. Sometimes the Yizier is a mere deputy, 
sometimes an independent potentate. If it is expe- 
dient for the Company to show some legal title to 
the revenues of Bengal, the grant under the seal of 
the Mogul is brought forward as an instrument of the 
highest authority. "When the Mogul asks for the 
rents which were reserved to him by that very grant, 
he is told that he is a mere pageant, that the English 
power rests on a very different foundation from a 
charter given by him, that he is welcome to play at 
royalty as long as he likes, but that he must expect no 
tribute from the real masters of India. 

It is true that it was in the power of others, as well 
as of Hastings, to practise this legerdemain; but in 
the controversies of governments, sophistry is of little 
use unless it be backed by power. There is a principle 
which Hastings was fond of asserting in the strongest 
terms, and on which he acted with undeviating steadi- 
ness. It is a principle which, we must own, though it 
may be grossly abused, can hardly be disputed in the 
present state of public law. It is this, that where an 
ambiguous question arises between two governments, 
there is, if they cannot agree, no appeal except to 
force, and that the opinion of the stronger must 
prevail. Almost every question was ambiguous in 



WARREN HASTINGS. 105 

India. The Euglisli governmeut was tlie strongest in 
India. The consequences are obvious. The English 
government might do exactly what it chose. 

The English government now chose to wring money- 
out of Cheyte Sing. It had formerly been convenient 
to treat him as a sovereign prince ; it was now con- 
venient to treat him as a subject. Dexterity inferior 
to that of Hastings could easily find, in the general 
chaos of laws and customs, arguments for either 
course. Hastings wanted a great supply. It was 
known that Cheyte Sing had .^. large revenue, and it 
was suspected that he had accumulated a treasure. 
Nor was he a favourite at Calcutta. He had, when the 
Governor- General was in great difficulties, courted the 
favour of Francis and Clavering. Hastings, who, 
less perhaps from evil passions than from policy, 
seldom left an injury unpunished, was not soriy that 
the fate of Cheyte Sing should teach neighbouring 
princes the same lesson which the fate of Xuncomar 
had already impressed on the inhabitants of Bengal. 

In 1778, on the first breaking out of the war with 
France, Cheyte Sing was called upon to pay, in addi- 
tion to his fiied tribute, an extraordinary contribution 
of fifty thousand pounds. In 1779, an equal sum was 
exacted. In 1780, the demand was renewed, Cheyte 
Sing, in the hope of obtaining some indulgence, 
secretly offered the Governor-General a bribe of 



106 WAREEN HASTINGiS. 

twenty tlioasand pounds. Hastings took the money, 
and his enemies have maintained that he took it intend- 
ing to keep it. He certainly concealed the transaction, 
for a time, both from the Council in Bengal and from 
the Directors at home ; nor did he ever give any satis- 
factory reason for the concealment. Public spirit, or 
the fear of detection, at last determined him to with- 
stand the temptation. He paid over the bribe to the 
Company's treasury, and insisted that the Rajah 
should instantly comply with the demands of the 
English government. The Rajah, after the fashion 
3f his countrymen, shufl9.ed, solicited, and pleaded 
poverty. The grasp of Hastings was not to be so 
eluded. He added to the requisition another ten thou- 
sand pounds as a fine for delay, and sent troops to 
exact the money. 

The money was paid. But this was not enough. 
The late events in the south of India had increased the 
financial embarrassments of the Company. Hastings 
was determined to plunder Cheyte Sing, and, for that 
end, to fasten a quarrel on him. Accordingly, the 
E-ajah was now required to keep a body of cavalry for 
the service of the British government. He objected 
and evaded. This was exactly what the Governor- 
G-eneral wanted. He had now a pretext for treating 
the wealthiest of his vassals as a criminal. "I 
resolved" (these are the words of Hastings himseK) 



WARREN HASTII^GS. 107 

** to draw from Ms guilt tlie means of relief of the 
Company's distresses, to make him pay largely for 
liis pardon, or to exact a severe vengeance for past 
delinquency." The plan was simply this, to demand 
larger and larger contributions till the Rajah should 
be driven to remonstrate, then to call his remonstrance 
a crime, and to punish them by confiscating all his 
possessions. 

Cheyte Sing was in the greatest dismay. He offered 
two hundred thousand pounds to propitiate the British 
Government. But Hastings replied that nothing less 
than half a million would be accepted. Nay, he began 
to think of selling Benares to Oude, as he had formerly 
sold Allahabad and Eohilcund. The matter was one 
which could not be well managed at a distance ; and 
Hastings resolved to visit Benares. 

Cheyte Sing received his liege lord with every mark 
of reverence, came near sixty miles, with his guards, 
to meet and escort the illustrious visitor, and expressed 
his deep concern at the displeasure of the English. 
He even took off his turban, and laid it in the lap of 
Hastings, a gesture which in India marks the most 
profound submission and devotion. Hastings behaved 
with cold and repulsive severity. Having arrived at 
Benares, he sent to the Rajah a paper containing the 
demands of the government of Bengal. The Rajah, in 
reply, attempted to clear himseK from the accusations 



108 WAHREN HASTINGS. 

brouglit against Lim. Hastings, who wanted money 
and not excuses, was not to be put ofE by the ordinary 
artifices of Eastern negotiation. He instantly ordered 
the Rajah to be arrested and placed under the custody 
of two companies of sepoys. 

In taking these strong measures, Hastings scarcely 
showed his usual Judgment. It is possible that, having 
jiad little opportunity of personally observing any part 
of the population of India, except the Bengalees, he 
was not fully aware of the difference between their 
character and that of the tribes which inhabit tho 
upper provinces. He w&s now in & land far mora 
favourable to the vigour of the human frame than tha 
Delta of the Ganges ; in a land fruitful of soldiers, 
who have been found worthy to follow English batta- 
lions to the charge and into the breach. The Rajah 
was popular among his subjects. His administration 
had been mild; and the prosj)erity of the district 
which he governed presented a striking contrast to the 
depressed state of Bahar under our rule, and a still 
more striking contrast to the misery of the provinces 
which were cursed by the tyranny of the Nabob Yizier. 
The national and religious prejudices with which the 
English were regarded throughout India were pecu- 
liarly intense in the metropolis of the Brahminical 
superstition. It can therefore scarcely be doubted 
that the Governor-General, before he outraged the 



WARREN HASTINGS. 109 

dignity of Cliejte Sing by an arrest, ouglit to have 
assembled a force capable of bearing down all oppo- 
sition. This had not been done. The handful of sepoys 
who attended Hastings would probably have been 
sufficient to overawe Moorshedabad, or the Black Town 
of Calcutta. But they were unequal to a conflict with 
the hardy rabble of Benares. The streets surrounding 
the palace were filled by an immense multitude, of 
whom a large proportion, as is usual in Upper India, 
wore arms. The tumult became a fight, and the fight 
a massacre. The English officers defended themselves 
with desperate courage, against overwhelming numbers, 
and fell, as became them, sword in hand. The sepoys 
were butchered. The gates were forced. The captive 
prince, neglected by his gaolers during the confusion, 
discovered an outlet which opened on the precipitous 
bank of the Ganges, let himself down to the water by 
a string made of the turbans of his attendants, found a 
boat, and escaped to the opposite shore. 

If Hastings had, by indiscreet violence, brought 
himseK into a difficult and perilous situation, it is only 
just to acknowledge that he extricated himself with 
even more than his usual ability and presence of mind. 
He had only fiity men with him. The building in 
which he had taken up his residence was on every side 
blockaded by the insurgents. But his fortitude re- 
mained unshaken. The Bajali, from the other side of 



110 WARREN HASTINGS. 

the river, sent apologies and liberal offers. Tiiey were 
not even answered. Some subtle and enterprising men 
were found wlio undertook to pass through the throng 
of enemies, and to convey the intelligence of the late 
events to the English cantonments. It is the fashion 
of the natives of India to wear large earrings of gold. 
When they travel, the rings are laid aside, lest the 
precious metal should tempt some gang of robbers; 
and, in place of the ring, a quill or a roU of paper is 
inserted in the orifice to prevent it from closing. 
Hastings placed in the ears of his messengers letters 
rolled up in the smallest compass. Some of these letters 
were addressed to the commanders of the English troops. 
One was written to assure his wife of his safety. One 
was to the envoy whom he had sent to negotiate with 
the Mahrattas. Instructions for the negotiation were 
needed; and the Governor- General framed them, in 
that situation of extreme danger, with as much com- 
posure as if he had been writing in his palace at 
Calcutta. 

Things, however, were not yet at the worst. An 
English officer of more spirit than judgment, eager to 
distinguish himself, made a premature attack on the 
insurgents beyond the river. His troops were en- 
tangled in narrow streets, and assailed by a furious 
population. He fell, with many of his men ; and the 
survivors were forced to retire. 



WARREN HASTINGS. ' 111 

This event produced the effect which has never failed 
to follow every check, however slight, sustained in 
India by the English arms. For hundreds of miles 
round, the whole country was in commotion. The 
entire population of the district of Benares took arms. 
The fields were abandoned by the husbandmen, who 
thronged to defend their prince. The infection spread 
to Oude. The oppressed people of that province rose 
up against the Nabob Yizier, refused to pay their im- 
posts, and put the revenue officers to flight. Even 
Bahar was ripe for revolt. The hopes of Cheyte Sing 
began to rise. Instead of imploring mercy in the 
humble style of a vassal, he began to talk the language 
of a conqueror, and threatened, it was said, to sweep 
the white usurpers out of the land. But the English 
troops were now assembling fast. The officers, and 
even the private men, regarded the Governor- General 
with enthusiastic attachment, and flew to his aid with 
an alacrity which, as he boasted, had never been 
shown on any other occasion. Major Popham, a brave 
and skilful soldier, who had highly distinguished 
himseK in the Mahratta war, and in whom the 
Governor- General reposed the greatest confidence, took 
the command. The tumultuary army of the Rajah was 
put to rout. His fastnesses were stormed. In a few 
hours above thirty thousand men left his standard and 
returned to their ordinary avocations. The unhappy 



112 " WARREN HASTINGS. 

prince fled from Lis country for ever. His fair domain 
was added to tlie Britisli dominions. One of Ms rela- 
tions, indeed, was appointed Rajali ; but the Rajali of 
Benares was hencefortli to be, like the Nabob of 
Bengal, a mere pensioner. 

By tliis revolution an addition of two hundred 
thousand pounds a year was made to the revenues of 
the Company. But the immediate relief was not as 
great as had been expected. The treasure laid up by 
Cheyte Sing had been popularly estimated at a million 
sterling. It turned out to be about a fourth part of 
that sum; and, such as it was, it was seized by the 
army, and divided as prize-money. 

Disappointed in his expectations from Benares, 
Hastings was more violent than he would otherwiss 
have been, in his dealings with Oude. Sujah Dowlah 
had long been dead. His son and successor, Asaph- 
ul-Dowlah, was one of the weakest and most vicious 
even of Eastern princes. His life was divided be- 
tween torpid repose and the most odious forms of 
sensuality. In his court there was boundless waste, 
throughout his dominions wretchedness and disorder. 
He had been, under the skilful management of the 
English government, gradually sinking from the rank 
of an independent prince to that of a vassal of the 
Company. It was only by the help of a British 
brigade that he could be secure from the aggi'essions 



WAKEEN HASTINGS. 113 

of neighbours who despised his weakness, and from 
the vengeance of subjects who detested his tyranny. 
A brigade was furnished; and he engaged to defray 
the charge of paying and maintaining it. From that 
time his independence was at an end. Hastings was 
not a man to lose the advantage which he had thus 
gained. The Nabob soon began to complain of the 
burden which he had undertaken to bear. His 
revenues, he said, were falling off; his servants 
were unpaid ; he could no longer support the expense 
of the arrangement which he had sanctioned. Hastings 
would not listen to these representations. The Yizier, 
he said, had invited the government of Bengal to send 
him troops, and had promised to pay for them. The 
troops had been sent. How long the troops were to 
remain in Oude was a matter not settled by the treaty. 
It remained, therefore, to be settled between the con- 
tracting parties. But the contracting parties differed. 
Who then must decide ? The stronger. 

Hastings also argued that, if the English force was 
withdrawn, Oude would certainly become a prey to 
anarchy, and would probably be overrun by a Mahratta 
army. That the finances of Oude were embarrassed he 
admitted. But he contended, not without reason, that 
the embarrassment was to be attributed to the in- 
capacity and vices of Asaph-nl-Dowlah himself, and 
that if less were spent on the troops, the only effect 



114 WAEEE]^ HASTINGS. 

would be that more would be squandered on wortliless 
faTourites. 

Hastings bad intended, after settling tbe affairs of 
Benares, to yisit Lucknow, and tbere to confer with 
Asapb-ul-Dowlab. But tbe obsequious courtesy of 
tbe Nabob Yizier prevented tbis visit. Witb a small 
train be hastened to meet tbe Governor-General. An 
intervieif took place in tbe fortress wbicb, from tbe 
crest of tbe precipitous [rock of Cbunar, looks down 
on tbe waters of tbe Ganges. 

At first sigbt it migbt appear impossible tbat tbe 
negotiation sbould come to an amicable close. Hastings 
wanted an extraordinary supply of money. Asapb-ul- 
Dowlab wanted to obtain a remission of wbat be 
already owed. Sucb a difference seemed to admit of no 
compromise. Tbere was, however, one course satis- 
factory to both sides, one course by wbicb it was 
possible to relieve tbe finances both of Oude and of 
Bengal ; and that course was adopted. It was simply 
tbis, that the Governor- General and tbe Nabob Yizier 
sbould join to rob a third party ; and the third party 
whom they determined to rob was a parent of one of 
tbe robbers. 

Tbe mother of the late Nabob and bis wife, who was 
tbe mother of tbe present Nabob, were known as the 
Begums or Princesses of Oude. They, had possessed 
great influenoe over Sujah Dow lab, and had, at his 



WAREEN HASTINGS. 115 

deatli, been left in possession of a splendid dotation. 
The domains of wliicli they received the rents and 
administered the government were of wide extent. 
The treasure hoarded by the late Nabob, a treasure 
which was popularly estimated at near three millions 
sterling, was in their hands. They continued to 
occupy his favourite palace at Fyzabad, the Beautiful 
Dwelling; while Asaph-ul-Dowlah held his court in 
the stately Lucknow, which he had built for himseK on 
the shores of the Goomti, and had adorned with noble 
mosques and colleges. 

Asaph-ul-Dowlah had already extorted considerable 
sums from his mother. She had at length appealed 
to the English; and the English had interfered. A 
solemn compact had been made, by which she con- 
sented to give her son some pecuniary assistance, and 
he in his turn promised never to commit any further 
invasion of her rights. This compact was formally 
guaranteed by the Government of Bengal. But times 
had changed; money was wanted; and the power 
which had given the guarantee was not ashamed to 
instigate the spoiler to excesses such that even he 
shrank from them. 

It was necessary to find some pretext for a con- 
fiscation inconsistent, not merely with plighted faith, 
not merely with the ordinary rules of humanity and 
justice, but also with that great law of filial piety 



116 WARREN HASTia'GS. 

whicli, even in tlie -wildest tribes of savages, even in 
those more degraded communities "wliicli wither under 
the influence of a corrupt half-civilisation, retains a 
certain authority over the human mind. A pretext 
was the last thing that Hastings was likely ta want. 
The insurrection at Benares had produced disturbances 
in Oude. These disturbances it was convenient to 
impute to the Princesses. Evidence for the imjoutation 
there was scarcely any ; unless reports wandering from 
one mouth to another, and gaining something by every 
transmission, may be called evidence. The accused 
were furnished with no charge ; they were permitted 
to make no defence ; for the Governor- Greneral wisely 
considered that, if he tried them, he miglat not be able 
to find a ground for plundering them. It was agreed 
between him and the Nabob Yizier that the noble 
ladies should, by a sweeping act of confiscation, be 
stripped of their domains and treasures for the benefit 
of the Company, and that the sums thus obtained 
should be accepted by the government of Bengal 
in satisfaction of its claims on the government of 
Oude. 

While Asaph-ul-Dowlah was at Chunar, he was 
completely subjugated by the clear and commanding 
intellect of the English statesman. But, when they 
had separated, the Yizier began to reflect with un- 
easiness on the engagements into which he had entered. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 117 

His motlier and grandmotlier protested and implored. 
His heart, deeply corrupted by absolute power and 
licentious pleasures, yet not naturally unfeeling, failed 
him in this crisis. Even the English resident at 
Lucknow, though hitherto devoted to Hastings, shrank 
from extreme measures. But the Governor-General was 
inexorable. He wrote to the resident in terms of the 
greatest severity, and declared that, if the spoliation 
which had been agreed uj^on were not instantly carried 
into effect, he would himself go to Lucknow, and do 
that from which feebler minds recoiled with dismay. 
The resident, thus menaced, waited on his Highness 
and insisted that the treaty of Chunar should be 
carried into full and immediate effect. Asaph-ul- 
Dowlah yielded, making at the same time a solemn 
protestation that ho yielded to compulsion. The lands 
were resumed ; but the treasure was not so easily ob- 
tained. It was necessary to use violence. A body of 
the Company's troops marched to Eyzabad, and forced 
the gates of the palace. The Princesses were confined 
to their own apartments. But still they refused to 
submit. Some more stringent mode of coercion was 
to be found. A mode was found of which, even at 
this distance of time, we cannot speak without shame 
and sorrow. 

There were at Fyzabad two ancient men, belonging 
to that unhappy class which a practice, of immemorial 



118 WARREN HASTINGS. 

antiquity in tlie East, lias excluded from the pleasures 
of love and from tlie liope of posterity. It lias always 
been held in Asiatic courts that beings thus estranged 
from sympathy with their kind are those whom princes 
may most safely trust. Sujah Dowlah had been of 
this opinion. He had given his entire confidence to 
the two eunuchs ; and after his death they remained at 
the head of the household of his widow. 

These men were, by the orders of the British 
government, seized, imprisoned, ironed, starved almost 
to death, in order to extort money from the Princesses. 
After they had been two months in confinement, their 
health gave way. They implored permission to take a 
little exercise in the garden of their prison. The officer 
who was in charge of them stated that, if they were 
allowed this indulgence, there was not the smallest 
chance of their escaping, and that their irons really 
added nothing to the security of the custody in which 
they were kept. He did not understand the plan of 
his superiors. Their object in these inflictions was 
not security but torture; and all mitigation was 
refused. Yet this was not the worst. It was resolved 
by an English government that these two infirm old 
men should be delivered to the tormentors. For that 
purpose they were removed to Lucknow. What 
horrors their dungeon there witnessed can only be 
guessed. But there remains on the records of 



WAEEEN HASTINGS. 119 

Parliament tliis letter, written by a Britisli resident 
to a British soldier. 

" Sir, the Nabob having determined to inflict corporal 
punishment upon the prisoners under your guard, this 
is to desire that his officers, when they shall come, may 
have free access to the prisoners, and be permitted to 
do with them as they shall see proper.'* 

While these barbarities were perpetrated at Lucknow, 
the Princesses were still under duress at Fyzabad. 
Pood was allowed to enter their apartments only in such 
scanty quantities that their f emate attendants were in 
danger of perishing with hunger. Month after month 
this cruelty continued, till at length, after twelve 
hundred thousand pounds had been wrung out of the 
Princesses, Hastings began to think that he had really 
got to tlie bottom of their coffers, and that no rigour 
could extort more. Then at length the wretched men 
who were detained at Lucknow regained their liberty. 
When their irons were knocked off, and the doors of 
their prison opened, their quivering lips, the tears 
which ran down their cheeks, and the thanksgivings 
which they poured forth to the common Father of 
Mussulmans and Christians, melted even the stout 
hearts of the English warriors who stood by. 

But we must not forget to do justice to Sir Elijah 
Impey's conduct on this occasion. It was not indeed 
oasy for him to intrude himself into a business so 



120 WARREN HASTINGS. 

entirely alien from all his oflB.cial duties. But there 
was something inexpressibly alluring, we must suppose, 
in the peculiar rankness of the infamy which was then 
to be got at Lucknow. He hurried thither as fast as 
relays of palanquin-bearers could carry him. A crowd 
of people came before him with affidavits against the 
Begums, ready drawn in their hands. Those affidavits 
he did not read. Some of them, indeed, he could not 
read ; for they were in the dialects of Northern India, 
and no interpreter was employed. He administered 
the oath to the deponents with all possible expedition, 
and asked not a single question, not even whether they 
had perused the statements to which they swore. This 
work performed, he got again into his palanquin, and 
posted back to Calcutta, to be in time for the opening 
of term. The cause was one which, by his own 
confession, lay altogether out of his jurisdiction. 
Under the charter of justice, he had no more right to 
inquire into crimes committed by Asiatics in Oude 
than the Lord President of the Court of Session of 
Scotland to hold an assize at Exeter. He had no right 
to try the Begums, nor did he pretend to try them. 
"With what object, then, did he undertake so long a 
journey? Evidently in order that he might give, in 
an irregular manner, that sanction which in a regular 
manner he could not give, to the crimes of those who 
had recently hired him ; and in order that a confused 



WARREN HASTINGS. 121 

mass of testimony wliicli lie did not sift, wliicli lie did 
not even read, miglit acquire an authority not properly 
belonging to it, from tke signature of the highest 
judicial functionary in India. 

The time was approaching, however, when he was 
to be stripped of that robe which has never, since the 
Revolution, been disgraced so foully as by him. The 
state of India had for some time occupied much of the 
attention of the British Parliament. Towards the 
close of the American war, two committees of the 
Commons sat on Eastern affairs. In one Edmund 
Burke took the lead. The other was under the 
presidency of the able and versatile Henry Dundas, 
then Lord Advocate of Scotland. G-reat as are the 
changes which, during the last sixty years, have taken 
place in our Asiatic dominions, the reports which those 
committees laid on the table of the House will still be 
found most interesting and instructive. 

There was as yet no connection between the Company 
and either of the great parties in the state. The 
ministers had no motive to defend Indian abuses. On 
the contrary, it was for their interest to show, if 
possible, that the government and patronage of our 
Oriental empire might, with advantage, be transferred 
to themselves. The votes, therefore, which, in conse- 
quence of the reports made by the two committees, 
were passed by the Commons, breathed the spirit of 



122 WARREN HASTINGS. 

stern and indignant justice. Tlio severest epithets 
were applied to several of tlie measures of Hastings, 
especially to tlie Rohilla war ; and it was resolved, on 
tlie motion of Mr. Dundas, that the Company ought to 
recall a Governor- General who had brought such 
calamities on the Indian people, and such dishonour on 
the British name. An act was passed for limiting the 
jurisdiction of the supreme Court. The bargain which 
Hastings had made with the Chief Justice was con- 
demned in the strongest terms; and an address was 
presented to the king, praying that Impey might be 
summoned home to answer for his misdeeds. 

. Impey was recalled by a letter from the Secretary of 
State. But the proprietors of India stock resolutely 
refused to dismiss Hastings from their service, and 
passed a resolution affirming, what was undeniably 
true, that they were intrusted by law with the right of 
naming and removing their Governor- General, and that 
they were not bound to obey the directions of a single 
branch of the legislature with respect to such nomina- 
tion or removal. 

Thus supported by his employers, Hastings remained 
at the head of the government of Bengal till the spring 
of 1785. His administration, so eventful and stormy, 
closed in almost perfect quiet. In the Council there 
was no regular opposition to his measures. Peace was 
restored to India. The Mahratta war had ceased. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 123 

Hyder was no more. A treaty had. been concluded 
witli his son, Tippoo; and the Carnatic had been 
evacuated by the armies of Mysore. Since the ter- 
mination of the American war, England had no 
European enemy or rival in the Eastern seas. 

On a general review of the long administration of 
Hastings, it is impossible to deny that, against the 
great crimes by which it is blemished, we have to set 
off great public services. England had passed through 
a perilous crisis. She still, indeed, maintained her 
place in the foremost rank of European powers ; and 
the manner in which she had defended herseK against 
fearful odds had inspired surrounding nations with a 
high opinion both of her spirit and of her strength. 
Nevertheless, in every part of the world, except ono, 
she had been a loser. Not only had she been compelled 
to acknowledge the independence of thirteen colonies 
peopled by her children, and to conciliate the Irish by 
giving up the right of legislating for them ; but, in the 
Mediterranean, in the GuK of Mexico, on the coast of 
Africa, on the continent of America, she had been 
compelled to cede the fruits of her victories in former 
wars. Spain regained Minorca and Florida; France 
regained Senegal, Goree, and several West Indian 
Islands. The only quarter of the world in which 
Britain had lost nothing was the quarter in which her 
interests had been committed to the care of Hastings. 



124 WAIIP.EN HASTINGS. 

In spite of tlie utmost exertions both of European and 
Asiatic enemies, tlie power of our country in the East 
had been greatly augmented. Benares was subjected ; 
the Nabob Yizier reduced to vassalage. That our 
influence had been thus extended, nay, that Fort 
William and Fort St, George had not been occupied by 
hostile armies, was owing, if we may trust the general 
voice of the English in India, to the skill and resolution 
of Hastings. 

His internal administration, with all its blemishes, 
gives him a title to be considered as one of the most 
remarkable men in our history. He dissolved the 
double government. He transferred the direction of 
affairs to English hands. Out of a frightful anarchy 
he educed at least a rude and imperfect order. The 
whole organisation by which justice was dispensed, 
revenue collected, peace maintained throughout a 
territory not inferior in population to the dominions of 
Lewis the Sixteenth or the Emperor Joseph, was 
formed and superintended by him. He boasted that 
every public office, without exception, which existed 
when he left Bengal, was his creation. It is quite 
true that this system, after all the improvements 
suggested by the experience of sixty years, still needs 
improvement, and that it was at ftrst far more defective 
than it now is. But whoever seriously considers what 
it is to construct from the beginning the whole of a 



WARREN HASTINGS. 125 

macliine so vast and complex as a government, will 
allow tliat what Hastings effected deserves tigli 
admiration. To compare the most celebrated European 
ministers to Mm seems to ns as unjust as it would be 
to compare tlie best baker in London with E-obinson 
Crusoe, who, before lie could bake a single loaf, bad 
to make bis plough and his harrow, his fences and his 
scarecrows, his sickle and his flail, his mill and his 
oven. 

The Just fame of Hastings rises still higher when 
we reflect that he was not bred a statesman ; that 
he was sent from school to a counting-house; and 
that he was employed during the prime of his man- 
hood as a commercial agent, far from all intellectual 
society. 

Nor must we forget that all, or almost aU, to whom, 
when placed at the head of affairs, he could apply for 
assistance, were persons who owed as little as himself, 
or less than himseK, to education. A minister in 
Europe finds himseK, on the first day on which he 
commences his functions, surrounded by experienced 
public servants, the depositaries of official traditions. 
Hastings had no such help. His own reflection, his 
own energy, were to supply the place of all Downing 
Street and Somerset House. Having had no facilities 
tor learning, he was forced to teach. He had first to 
form himself, and then to form his instruments : and 



126 WAEKEN HASTINGS. 

this not in a single department, but in all tlie depart- 
ments of the administration. 

It must be added that, while engaged in this most 
arduous task, he was constantly trammelled by orders 
from home, and frequently borne down by a majority 
in council. The preservation of an Empire from a 
formidable combination of foreign enemies, the con- 
struction of a government in all its parts, were accom- 
plished by him, while every ship brought out bales of 
censure from his employers, and while the records of 
every consultation were filled with acrimonious minutes 
by his colleagues. "We believe that there never was a 
public man whose temper was so severely tried ; not 
Marlborough, when thwarted by the Dutch Deputies ; 
not "Wellington, when he had to deal at once with the 
Portuguese Regency, the Spanish Juntas, and Mr. Per- 
ceval. But the temper of Hastings was equal to 
almost any trial. It was not sweet ; but it was calm. 
Quick and vigorous as his intellect was, the patience 
with which he endured the most cruel vexations, till a 
remedy could be found, resembled the patience of 
stupidity. He seems to have been capable of resent- 
ment, bitter and long-enduring ; yet his resentment so 
seldom hurried him into any blunder, that it may be 
doubted whether what appeared to be revenge was any- 
thing but policy. 

The e:ffect of this singular equanimity was that he 



WAKKEN HASTINGS. 127 

always had the full command of all the resources of 
one of the most fertile minds that ever existed. Ac- 
cordingly, no complication of perils and embarrass- 
ments could perplex him. For every difficulty he had 
a contrivance ready ; and, whatever may be thought of 
the justice and humanity of some of his contrivances, 
it is certain that they seldom failed to serve the pur- 
pose for which they were designed. 

Together with this extraordinary talent for devising 
expedients, Hastings possessed, in a very high degree, 
another talent scarcely less necessary to a man in his 
situation ; we mean the talent for conducting political 
controversy. It is as necessary to an English states- 
man in the East that he should be able to write, as it 
is to a minister in this country that he should be able 
to speak. It is chiefly by the oratory of a public man 
here that the nation judges of his powers. It is from 
the letters and reports of a public man in India 
that the dispensers of patronage form their esti- 
mate of him. In each case, the talent which receives 
peculiar encouragement is developed, perhaps at the 
expense of the other powers. In this country we 
sometimes hear men speak above their abilities. It is 
not very unusual to find gentlemen in the Indian ser- 
vice who write above their abilities. The English 
politician is a little too much of a debater ; the Indiai* 
politician a little too much of an essayist. 



128 WAEEEN HASTINGS. 

Of the mimeroTis seryants of tHo Company wlio have 
distingnislied. themselves as framers of minutes and 
despatches, Hastings stands at the head. He was in- 
deed the person who gave to the official writing of the 
Indian governments the character which it still re- 
tains. He was matched against no common antagonist. 
Bnt even Francis was forced to acknowledge, with 
sullen and resentful candour, that there was no con- 
tending against the pen of Hasi.ings. And, in truth, 
the Governor- General's power of making out a case, of 
perplexing what it was inconvenient that people should 
understand, and of setting in the clearest point of view 
whatever would hear the light, was incomparable. His 
style must be praised with some reservation. It was 
in general forcible, pure, and polished; but it was 
sometimes, though not often, turgid, and, on one or two 
occasions, even bombastic. Perhaps the fondness of 
Hastings for Persian literature may have tended to 
corrupt his taste. 

And, since we have referred to his literary tastes, it 
would be most unjust not to praise the judicious en- 
couragement, which, as a ruler, he gave to liberal 
studies and curious researches. His patronage was 
extended, with prudent generosity, to voyages, travels, 
experiments, publications. He did little, it is true, 
towards introducing into India the learning of 
the West. To make the young natives of Bengal 



WARREN HASTINGS. 129' 

familiar -witli Milton and Adam Smith, to substitute 
the geography, astronomy, and surgery of Europe for 
the dotages of the Brahminical superstition, or for the 
imperfect science of ancient Greece transfused through 
Arabian expositions, this was a scheme reserved to- 
crown the beneficent administration of a far more vir- 
tuous ruler. Still it is imjDossible to refuse high com- 
mendation to a man who, taken from a ledger to govern 
an empire, overwhelmed by public business, surrounded' 
by people as busy as himself, and separated by thou- 
sands of leagues from almost all literary society, gave,, 
both by his example and by his munificence, a great im- 
pulse to learning. In Persian and Arabic literature 
he was deeply skilled. "With the Sanscrit he was not 
himself acquainted ; but those who first brought thai 
language to the knowledge of European students owed 
much to his encouragement. It was under his protec- 
tion that the Asiatic Society commenced its honourable 
career. That distinguished body selected him to be its 
first president ; but, with excellent taste and feeling, he- 
declined the honour in favour of Sir William Jones. 
But the chief advantage which the students of Oriental 
letters derived from his patronage remains to be men- 
tioned. The Pundits of Bengal had always looked 
with great jealousy on the attempts of foreigners to 
pry into those mysteries which were locked up in the 
sacred dialect. The Brahminical religioa had beeB 
E— 1 



130 WARREN HASTINGS. 

persecuted hj the Malioinmedans. Wliat the Hindoos 
knew of tlie spirit of the Portuguese government 
might warrant them in apprehending persecution from 
Christians. That apprehension, the wisdom and 
moderation of Hastings removed. Ho was the first 
foreign ruler who succeeded in gaining the confidence 
of the hereditary priests of India, and who induced 
them to lay open to English scholars the secrets of tlie 
old Brahminieal theology and jurisprudence. 

It is indeed impossible to deny that, in the great art 
of inspiring large masses of human beings with con- 
fidence and attachment, no ruler ever surpassed Hast- 
ings. If he had made himself popular with the English 
by giving up the Bengalees to extortion and oppression, 
or if, on the other hand, ho had conciliated the Ben- 
galees and alienated the English, there would have 
been no cause for wonder. What is peculiar to him is 
that, being the chief of a small ba,nd of strangers, wlio 
exercised boundless power over a great indigenous 
population, he made himseK beloved both by the sub- 
ject many and by the dominant few. The affection 
felt for bim by the civil service was singularly ardent 
and constant. Through all his disasters and perils, his 
brethren stood by him with st-eadfast loyalty. The 
army, at the same time, loved him as armies hava 
seldom, loved any but the greatest chiefs who bave 
led them to victory. Even in his disputes with 



■VTAllliEN HASTINGS. 131 

distinguished military men, lie could always count on 
the support of the military profession. While such 
was his empire over the hearts of his countrymen, he 
enjoyed among the natives a popularity such as other 
governors have perhaps better merited, but such as no 
other governor has been able to attain. He spoke their 
vernacular dialects with facility and precision. He 
was intimately acquainted with their feelings and 
usages. On one or two occasions, for great ends, he 
deliberately acted in defiance of their opinion ; but on 
such occasions he gained more in their respect than he 
lost in their love. In general, he carefully avoided all 
tliat could shock their national or religious prejudices. 
His administration was indeed in many respects faulty; 
but the Bengalee standard of good government was 
not high. Under the Nabobs, the hurricane of Mah- 
ratta cavalry had passed annually over the rich alluvial 
plain. But even the Mahratta shrank from a conflict 
with the mighty children of the sea ; and the immenso 
rice harvests of the Lower Ganges were safely gathered 
in, under the protection of the English sword. The 
first English conquerors had been more rapacious and 
merciless even than the Mahrattas ; but that generation 
had passed away. Defective as was the police, heavy 
as were the public bui-dens, it is probable that the 
oldest man in Bengal could not rev.ollect a season of 
equal security and prosperity. For the first finie 



132 WAREEN HASTINGS. 

within living memory, tlie province was placed under 
a government strong enough to prevent others from 
robbing, and not inclined to play the robber itseK. 
These things inspired good- will. At the same time the 
constant success of Hastings, and the manner In which 
he extricated himseK from every difficulty, made him an 
object of superstitious admiration ; and the more than 
regal splendour which he sometimes displayed dazzled 
a people who have much in common with children. 
Even now, after the lapse of more than fifty years, the 
natives of India still talk of him as the greatest of the 
English ; and nurses sing children to sleep with a 
jingling ballad about the fleet horses and richly 
caparisoned elephants of Sahib Warrf n Hostein. 

The gravest offence of which Hastings was guilty 
did not affect his popularity with the people of Bengal; 
for those offences were committed against neighbour- 
ing states. Those offences, as our readers must have 
perceived, we are not disposed to vindicate ; yet, in 
order that the censure may be justly apportioned to 
the transgression, it is fit that the motive of the 
criminal should be taken into consideration. The 
motive which prompted the worst acts of Hastings 
was misdirected and ill-regulated public spirit. The 
rules of justice, the sentiments of humanity, the 
plighted faith of treaties, wore in his view as nothing, 
when opposed to the immediate interest of the state. 



WARREN HASTINGS. 133 

Tliis is no justification, according to the principles 
either of morality, or of wliat we believe to be identical 
with morality, namely, far-sighted policy. Neverthe- 
less, the common sense of mankind, which in questions 
of this sort seldom goes far wrong, will always recog- 
nise a distinction between crimes which originate in 
an inordinate zeal for the commonwealth, and crimes 
which originate in selfish cupidity. To the benefit of 
this distinction Hastings is fairly entitled. There is, 
we conceive, no reason to suspect that the Rohilla war, 
the revolution of Benares, or the spoliation of the 
Princesses of Oude, added a rupee to his fortune. We 
will not aflS.rm that, in all pecuniary dealings, he 
showed that punctilious integrity, that dread of the 
faintest appearance of evil, which is now the glory of 
the Indian civil service. But when the school in 
which he had been trained, and the temptations to 
which he was exposed, are considered, we are more 
inclined to praise him for his general uprightness with 
respect to money, than rigidly to blame him for a few 
transactions which would now be called indelicate and 
irregular, but which even now would hardly be desig- 
nated as corrupt. A rapacious man he certainly was 
not. Had he been so, he would infallibly have re- 
turned to his country the richest subject in Europe. 
We speak within compass, when we say that, without 
applying any extraordinary pressure, he might easily 



134 WAE,E,EN HASTINGS. 

have obtained from tlie zemindars of the Company s 
provinces and from neighbouring princes, in the conrso 
of thirteen years, more than three millions sterling, 
and might have outshone the splendour of Carlton 
House and of the Falais Royal. He brought home a 
fortune such as a Governor- General, fond of state, and 
careless of thrift, might easily, during so long a tenure 
of office, save out of his legal salary. Mrs. Hastings, 
we are afraid, was less scrupulous. It was generally 
believed that she accepted presents with great alacrity, 
and that she thus formed, without the connivance of 
her husband, a private hoard amounting to several lacs 
of rupees. We are the more inclined to give credit to 
this story, because Mr. Gleig, .who cannot but have 
heard it, does not, so far as we have observed, notice or 
contradict it. 

The influence of Mrs. Hastings over her husband 
was indeed such that she might easily have obtained 
much larger sums than she was ever accused of re- 
ceiving. At length her health began to give way ; and 
the Governor- General, much against his will, was 
compelled to send her to England. He seems to have 
loved her with that love which is peculiar to men of 
strong minds, to men whose a:ffection is not easily won 
or widely diffused. The talk of Calcutta ran for some 
time on the luxurious manner in which he fitted up the 
ronud-iiouse of au Indlaraaii for her accommodation, on 



the profusiou of sandal- wood and carved ivory wliicli 
adorned her calDin, and on the thonsands of rupees 
which had been expi^nded in order to procure for her 
the society of an agreeable female companion during 
the voyage. We may remai-k here that the letters of 
Hastings to liis wife are exceedingly characteristic. 
They are tender, and full of indications of esteem and 
confidence ; but, at the same time, a little more cere- 
monious than is usual in so intimate a relation. The 
solemn courtesy with which he compliments " his 
elegant Marian" reminds us now and then of the 
dignified air with which Sir Charles Grandison bowed 
over Miss Byron's hand in the cedar parlour. 

After some months, Hastings prepared to follow his 
wife to England. When it was announced that he was 
about to quit his office, the feeling of the society which 
he had so long governed manifested itseK by many 
signs. Addresses poured in from Europeans and 
Asiatics, from civil functionaries, soldiers, and traders. 
On the day on which he delivered up the keys of 
office, a crowd of friends and admirers formed a lane 
to the quay where he embarked. Several barges 
escorted him far down the river ; and some attached 
friends refused to quit him till the low coast of Bengal 
was fading from the view, and till the pilot was leaving 
the ship. 

Of his voyage little is known, except that ke smmse^ 



136 WARREN HASTINGS. 

liimseK with books and with his pen ; and that, among 
the compositions by which he beguiled the tediousness 
of that long leisure, was a pleasing imitation of 
Horace's Otium Divos rogat. This little poem was 
inscribed to Mr. Shore, afterwards Lord Teignmouth, 
a man of whose integrity, humanity, and honour, it is 
impossible to speak too highly, but who, like some 
other excellent members of the civil service, extended 
to the conduct of his friend Hastings an indulgence of 
which his own conduct never stood in need. 

The voyage was, for those times, very speedy. 
Hastings was little more than four months on the sea. 
In June, 1785, he landed at Plymouth, posted to 
London, appeared at Court, paid his respects in 
Leadenhall Street, and then retired with his wife to 
Cheltenham. 

He was greatly pleased with his reception. The 
King treated him with marked distinction. The 
Queen, who had already incurred much censure on 
account of the favour which, in spite of the ordinary 
severity of her virtue, she had shown to the " elegant 
Marian," was not less gracious to Hastings. Th© 
Directors received him in a solemn sitting ; and their 
chairman read to him a vote of thanks which they had 
passed without one dissentient voice. " I find myself," 
said Hastings, in a letter written about a quarter of a 
year after his arrival in England, "I find myself 



WAREEN HASTINGS. 137 

everywhere, and universally, treated with evidences, 
apparent even to my own observation, that I possess 
the good opinion of my country." 

The confident and exulting tone of his correspondence 
about this time is the more remarkable, because he had 
already received ample notice of the attack which was 
in preparation. Within a week after he landed at 
Plymouth, Burke gave notice in the House of Commons 
of a motion seriously affecting a gentleman lately re- 
turned from India. The session, however, was then so 
far advanced, that it was impossible to enter on so 
extensive and important a subject. 

Hastings, it is clear, was not sensible of the 
danger of his position. Indeed that sagacity, that 
judgment, that readiness in devising expedients, which 
had distinguished him in the East, seemed now to 
have forsaken him ; not that his abilities were at all 
impaired ; not that he was not still the same man who 
had triumphed over Francis and IsTuncomar, who had 
made the Chief Justice and the Nabob Yizier his tools, 
who had deposed Cheyte Sing, and repelled Hyder Ali. 
But an oak, as Mr. Grattan finely said, should not be 
transplanted at fifty. A man who, having left England 
when a boy, returns to it after thirty or forty years passed 
in India, will find, be his talents what they may, that he 
has much both to learn and to unlearn before he can 
take a place among English statesmen. The working 



138 WAKFwEN HASTINGS. 

of a representative system, the war of parties, the arts 
of debate, the influence of the press, are startling 
novelties to him. Surrounded on every side by new 
machines and new tactics, he is as much bewildered as 
Hannibal would have been, at Waterloo, or Themis- 
tocles at Trafalgar. His very acuteness deludes him. 
His very vigour causes him to stumble. The more 
correct his maxims, when applied to the state of 
society to which he is accustomed, the more certain 
they are to lead him astray. This was strikingly the 
case with Hastings. In India he had a bad hand ; but 
he was master of the game, and he won every stake. 
In England he held excellent cards, if he had known 
how to play them ; and it was chiefly by his own errors 
that he was brought to the verge of ruin. 

Of all his errors the most serious was perhaps the 
choice of a champion. Olive, in similar circumstances, 
had made a singularly happy selection. He put him- 
self into the hands of "Wedderburn, afterwards Lord 
Loughborough, one of the few great advocates who 
have also been great in the House of Commons. To 
the defence of Olive, therefore, nothing was wanting, 
neither learning nor knowledge of the world, neither 
forensic acuteness nor that eloquence which charms 
political assemblies, Hastings intrusted his interests 
to a very di:fferent person, a Major in the Bengal 
army, named Scott. This gentleman had been sent 



WAP.PuEN HASTIIS^GS. 139 

over from India some time before as the agent of the 
Governor- General. It was rnmoured that his services 
were rewarded with Oriental munificence ; and wo 
believe that he received much more than Hastings 
could conveniently spare. The Major obtained a seat 
in Parliament, and was there regarded as the organ of 
his employer. It was evidently impossible that a 
gentleman so situated could speak with the authority 
whi.ch belongs to an independent position. Nor had 
the agent of Hastings the talents necessary for obtaining 
the ear of an assembly which, accustomed to listen to 
great orators, [had naturally become fastidious. He 
was always on his legs ; he was very tedious ; and he 
Had only one topic, the merits and wrongs of Hastings. 
Everybody who knows the House of Commons will 
easily guess what followed. The Major was soon con- 
sidered as the greatest bore of his time. His exertions 
were not confined to Parliament. There was hardly a 
day on which the newspapers did not contain some puff 
upon Hastings, signed Asiaticus or Bengalensis, but 
Imown to be written by the indefatigable Scott ; and 
hardly a month in which some bulky pamphlet on the 
same subject, and;f roni the same pen, did not pass to the 
trunk-makers and the pastry-cooks. As to this gentle- 
man's capacity for conducting a delicate question 
through Parliament, our readers will want no evidence 
beyond that which they will find in letters preserved in 



140 WARREN HASTIITGS. 

these volumes. We will give a single specimen of his 
temper and judgment. He designated the greatest man 
then living as " that reptile, Mr. Burke." 

In spite, however, of this unfortunate choice, the 
general aspect of affairs -was favourable to Hastings. 
The King was on his side. The Company and its 
servants were zealous in his cause. Among public 
men he had many ardent friends. Such were Lord 
Mansfield, who had outlived the vigour of his body, but 
not that of his mind ; and Lord Lansdowne, who, 
though unconnected with any party, retained the im- 
portance which belongs to great talents and knowledge. 
The ministers were generally believed to be favourable 
to the late Governor- General. They owed their power 
to the clamour which had been raised against Mr. Fox's 
East India Bill. The authors of that bill, when 
accused of invading vested rights, and of setting up 
powers unknown to the constitution, had defended 
themselves by pointing to the crimes of Hastings, and 
by arguing that abuses so extraordinary justified extra- 
ordinary measures. Those who, by opposing that bill, 
had raised themselves to the head of affairs, would 
naturally be inclined to extenuate the evils which had 
been made the plea for administering so violent a 
remedy; and such, in fact, was their general dispo- 
sition. The Lord Chancellor Thurlow, in particular, 
whose great place and force of intellect gave him a 



WARPvEN HASTINGS. 141 

weiglit in tlie government inferior only to that of Mr. 
Pitt, espoused tlie cause of Hastings with indecorous 
violence. Mr. Pitt, though he had censured many 
parts of the Indian system, had studiously abstained 
from saying a word against the late chief of the Indian 
government. To Major Scott, indeed, the young 
minister had in private extolled Hastings as a great, a 
wonderful man, who had the highest claims on the 
government. There was only one objection to granting 
all that so eminent a servant of the public could ask. 
The resolution of censure still remained on the journals 
of the House of Commons. That resolution was, in- 
deed, unjust; but till it was rescinded, could the 
minister advise the King to bestow any mark of appro- 
bation on the person censured ? If Major Scott is to 
be trusted, Mr. Pitt declared that this was the only 
reason which prevented the advisers of the Crown from 
conferring a peerage on the late Governor- General. 
Mr. Dundas was the only important member of the 
administration who was deeply committed to a different 
view of the subject. He had moved the resolution 
which created the difficulty ; but even from him little 
was to be apprehended. Since he had presided over 
the committee on Eastern affairs, great changes had 
taken place. He was surrounded by new allies; he 
had fixed his hopes on new objects ; and whatever may 
have been his good qualities (and he had many), 



142 WARKEN HASTINGS. 

ihittery itsolf never reckoned rigid consistency in the 
number. 

From the Ministry, therefore, Hastings had every 
reason to expect support ; and the Ministry was very 
powerful. The Opposition was loud and vehement 
against him. But the Opposition, though formidable 
from the wealth and influence of some of its members, 
and from the admirable talents and eloquence of others, 
was outnumbered in parliament, and odious throughout 
the country. Nor, as far as we can judge, was the 
Opposition generally desirous to engage in so serious 
an undertaking as the impeachment of an Indian 
Governor. Such an impeachment must last for years. 
It must impose on the chiefs of the party an immense 
load of labour. Yet it could scarcely, in any manner, 
affect the event of the great political game. The 
followers of the coalition were therefore more inclined 
to revile Hastings than to prosecute him. They lost 
no opportunity of coupling his name with the names of 
the most hateful tyrants of whom history makes men- 
tion. The wits of Brooks's aimed their keenest 
sarcasms both at his public and at his domestic life. 
Some fine diamonds which he had presented, as it was 
rumoured, to the royal family, and a certain richly 
carved iron bed which the Queen had done him the 
honour to accept from him, were favourite subjects of 
ridicule. One lively poet ]3roposed, that the great acts 



WARREN HASTINGS. 143 

of the fair Marian's present husband should be im- 
mortalised by the pencil of his predecessor; and that 
Imhoff should be employed to embellish the House of 
(.Commons with paintings of the bleeding Rohillas, of 
N'uncomar swinging, of Cheyte Sing letting himself 
down to the Ganges. Another, in an exquisitely 
liiimorous parody of Yirgil's third eclogue, propounded 
the question, what that mineral could be of which the 
rays had power to make the most austere of princesses 
the friend of a wanton. A third described, with gay 
malevolence, the gorgeous appearance of Mrs. Hastings 
at St. James's, the galaxy of jewels, torn from Indian 
Begums, which adorned her head-dress, her necklace 
gleaming with future votes, and the depending ques- 
tions that shone upon her ears. Satirical attacks of 
this description, and perhaps a motion for a vote of 
censure, woidd have satisfied the great body of the 
Opposition. But there were two men whose indigna- 
tion was not to be so appeased, Philip Francis and 
Edmund Burke. 

Francis had recently entered the House of Commons, 
and had already established a character there for 
industry and ability. He laboured indeed under one 
most unfortunate defect, want of fluency. But he 
occasionally expressed himself with a dignity and 
energy worthy of the greatest orators. Before he had 
beoji many days in parliament, he incurred the bitter 



144 WARREN HASTINGS. 

dislike of Pitt, who constantly treated Mm with ao 
much asperity as the laws of debate would allow. 
Neither lapse of years nor change of scene had miti- 
gated the enmities which Francis had brought back 
from the East. After his usual fashion, he mistook his 
malevolence for virtue, nursed it, as preachers tell us 
that we ought to nurse our good dispositions, and 
paraded it on all occasions, with Pharisaical ostenta- 
tion. 

The zeal of Burke was still fiercer ; but it was far 
purer. Men unable to understand the elevation of his 
mind have tried to find out some discreditable motive 
for the vehemence and pertinacity which he showed on 
this occasion. But they have altogether failed. The 
idle story that he had some private slight to revenge, 
has long been given up, even by the advocates of 
Hastings, Mr. Gleig supposes that Burke was actu- 
ated by party spirit : that he retained a bitter remem- 
brance of the fall of the coalition, that he attributed 
that fall to the exertions of the East India interest, and 
that he considered Hastings as the head and the repre- 
sentative of that interest. This explanation seems to 
be sufficiently refuted by a reference to dates. The 
hostility of Burke to Hastings commenced long before 
the coalition ; and lasted long after Burke had become 
a strenuous supporter of those by whom the coalition 
had been defeated. It began when Burke and Fos, 



WAEREN HASTINGS. 145 

closely allied together, were attacking the influence of 
the crown, and calling for pe^ce with the American 
republic. It continued till Burke, alienated from Fox, 
and loaded with the favours of the crown, died preach- 
ing a crusade against the French republic. We surely 
cannot attribute to the events of 1784 an enmity which 
began in 1781, and which retained undiminished force 
long after persons far more deeply implicated than 
Hastings in the events of 1784 had been cordially for- 
given. And why should we look for any other explana- 
tion of Burke's conduct than that which we find on the 
surface? The plain truth is that Hastings had 
committed some great crimes, and that the thought of 
those crimes made the blood of Burke boil in his veins. 
For Burke was a man in whom compassion for suffer- 
ing, and hatred of injustice and tyranny, were as strong 
as in Las Casas or Clarkson. And although in him, as 
in Las Casas and in Clarkson, these noble feelings 
were alloyed with the infirmity which belongs to human 
nature, he is, like them, entitled to this great praise, 
that he devoted years of intense labour to the service of 
a people with whom he had neither blood nor language, 
neither religion nor manners in common, and from 
whom no requital, no thanks, no applause could be ex- 
pected. 

His knowledge of India was such as few, even of 
those Europeans who have passed many years in that 



146 WARREN HASTINGS. 

country, have attained, and such as certainly was never 
attained by any public man who had not quitted 
Europe. He had studied the history, the laws, and the 
usages o£ the Bast with an industry such as is seldom 
found united to so much genius and so much sensibility. 
Others have perhaps been equally laborious, and have 
collected an equal mass of materials. But the manner 
in which Burke brought his higher powers of intellect 
to work on statements of facts, and on tables of figures, 
was peculiar to himseK. In every part of those huge 
bales of Indian information which repelled almost all 
other readers, his mind, at once philosophical and 
poetical, found something to instruct or to delight. 
His reason analysed and digested those vast and shape- 
less masses ; his imagina.tion animated and coloured 
them. Out of darkness, and dulness, and confusion, he 
formed a multitude of ingenious tlieories and vivid 
pictures. He had, in the highest degree, that noble 
faculty whereby man is able to live in the past and in 
the future, in the distant and in the unreal. India and 
its inhabitants were not to him, as to most Englishmen, 
mere names and abstractions, but a real country and a 
real people. The burning sun, the strange vegetation 
of the palm and the cocoa tree, the rice-field, the tank, 
the huge trees, older than the Mogul empire, under 
which the village crowds assemble, the thatched roof cP 
the peasant's hut, the rich tracery of the mosque whero 



WARREN HASTINGS. 147 

tho imaun prays with Ms face to Mecca, the drums, aud 
banners, and gaudy idols, the devotee swinging in the 
air, the graceful maiden, with the pitcher on her head, 
descending the steps to the river-side, the hlack faces, 
the long beards, the yellow streaks of sect, the turbans 
and the flowing robes, the spears and the silver maces, 
the elephants with their canopies of state, the gorgeous 
palanquin of the prince, and the close litter of the noble 
lady, aU these things were to him as the objects amidst 
which his own life had been passed, as the objects 
which lay on the road between Beaconsfield and St. 
James's Street. All India was present to the eye of 
his mind, from the halls where suitors laid gold and 
perfumes at the feet of sovereigns, to the wild moor 
wh«re the gipsy camp was pitched, from the bazaar, 
humming like the beehive with the crowd of buyers 
aud sellers, to the jungle where the lonely courier 
shakes his bunch of iron rings to scare away the 
hysenas. He had just as lively an idea of the insurrec- 
tion at Benares as of Lord Greorge Gordon's riots, and 
of the execution of Nuncomar as of the execution of 
Dr. Dodd. Oi^pression in Bengal was to him the same 
thing as oppression in the streets of London. 

He saw that Hastings had been guilty of some most 
unjustifiable acts. All that followed was natural and 
necessary in a mind like Burke's. His imagination 
and his passions, once excited, hurried him beyond the 



148 WAEE-EN HASTINGS 

bounds of justice and good sense. His reason, po^ver- 
ful as it was, became the slave of feelings wMch it 
should have controlled. His indignation, virtuous in 
its origin, acquired too much of the character of per- 
sonal aversion. He could see no mitigating circum- 
stance, no redeeming merit. His temper, which, 
though generous and aftectionate, had always been 
irritable, had now been made almost savage by bodily 
infirmities and mental vexations. Conscious of great 
powers and great virtues, he found himself, in ago 
and poverty, a mark for the hatred of a perfidious 
court and a deluded people. In Parliament his elo- 
quence was out of date. A young generation, which 
knew him not, had filled the House. Whenever he 
rose to speak, his voice was drowned by the unseemly 
interruption of lads who were in their cradles when his 
orations on the Stamp Act called forth the applause of 
the great Earl of Chatham. These things had pro- 
duced on his proud and sensitive spirit an effect at 
which we cannot wonder. He could no longer discuss 
any question with calmness, or make allowance for 
honest differences of opinion. Those who think that 
he was more violent and acrimonious in debates about 
India than on other occasions, are ill informed re- 
specting the last years of his life. In the discussions 
on the Commercial Treaty with the Court of Yer- 
sailles, on the Hegency, on the French Hevolution, he 



WAREEN HASTINaS. 149 

sBowed even more virulence than in conducting the 
impeachment. Indeed, it may be remarked, that the 
very persons who called him a mischievous maniac, for 
condemning in burning words the Rohilla war and the 
spoliation of the Begums, exalted him into a prophet as 
soon as he began to declaim, with greater vehemence, 
and not with greater reason, against the taking of the 
Bastile and the insults offered to Marie Antoinette. 
To ns he appears to have been neither a maniac in 
the former case, nor a prophet in the latter, but in 
both cases a great and good man, led into extravagance 
by a sensibility which domineered over all his facul- 
ties. 

It may be doubted whether the personal antipathy 
of Francis, or the nobler indignation of Burke, would 
have led their party to adopt extreme measures against 
Hastings, if his own conduct had been judicious. He 
should have felt that, great as his public services had 
been, he was not faultless, and should have been con- 
tent to make his escape, without aspiring to the 
honours of a triumph. He and his agent took a dif- . 
ferent view. They were impatient for the rewards 
which, as they conceived, were deferred only till 
Burke's attack should be over. They accordingly re- 
solved to force on a decisive action with an enemy for 
whom, if they had been wise, they would have made a 
bridge of gold. On the first day of the session of 



150 WAllREN KASTING3. 

1786, Major Scott reminded Burke of tlie notice given 
m tlie preceding year, and asked whether it was 
Heriously intended to bring any charge against the 
late Grovemor- General. This challenge left no course 
open to the Opposition, except to come forward as 
accusers, or to acknowledge themselves calumniators. 
The administration of Hastings had not been so 
blameless, nor was the great party of Fox and North 
so feeble, that it could be prudent to venture on so 
bold a defiance. The leaders of the Opposition in- 
stantly returned the only answer which they could 
with honour return ; and the whole party was irrevo- 
cably pledged to a prosecution. 

Burke began his operations by applying for Papers. 
Some of the documents for which he asked were re- 
fused by the ministers, who, in the debate, held 
language such as strongly confirmed the prevailing 
opinion, that they intended to support Hastings. In 
April the charges were laid on the table. They had 
been drawn by Burke with great ability, though in a 
form too much resembling that of a x^amphlet. 
Hastings was furnished with a copy of the accusation ; 
and it was intimated to him that he might, if he 
thought fit, be heard in his own defence at the Bar of 
the Commons. 

Here again, Hastings was pursued by the same 
fatality which had, attended him ever since the day 



WAEKEN HASTINGS. 351 

when he set foot on English ground. It seemed to be 
decreed that this man, so politic and so successful in 
the East, should commit nothing but blunders in 
Europe. Anj judicious adviser would haye told him 
that the best thing which he could do, would be to 
make an eloquent, forcible, and affecting oration at 
the bar of the House ; but that if he could not trust 
himseK to speak, and found it necessary to read, he 
ought to be as concise as possible. Audiences accus- 
tomed to extemporaneous debating of the highest ex- 
cellence, are always impatient of long written com- 
positions. Hastings, however, sat down as he would 
have done at the Government-house in Bengal, and 
prepared a paper of immense length. That paper, if 
recorded on the consultations of an Indian administra- 
tion, would have been justly praised as a very able 
minute. But it was now out of place. It fell flat, as 
the best written defence must have fallen flat, on an 
assembly accustomed to the animated and strenuous 
conflicts of Pitt and Fox. The members, as soon as 
their curiosity about the face and demeanour of so 
eminent a stranger was satisfied, walked away to 
dinner, and left Hastings to tell his story till midnight 
to the clerks and the Sergeant-at-Arms. 

All preliminary steps having been duly taken. 
Burke, in the beginning of June, brought forward 
the charge relating to the Hohilla war. He acted 



152 WARREN HASTINGS. 

discreetly in placing this accusation in the van; for 
Dundas had formerly moved, and the House had 
adopted, a resolution condemning, in the most severe 
terms, the policy followed by Hastings with regard to 
E-ohilcund. Dundas had little, or rather nothing, to 
say in defence of his own consistency ; but he put a 
bold face on the matter, and opposed the motion. 
Among other things, he declared that, though he still 
thought the RohiUa war unjustifiable, he considered 
the services which Hastings had subsequently ren- 
dered to the state as suflB.cient to atone even for so 
great an offence. Pitt did not speak, but voted with 
Dundas ; and Hastings was absolved by a hundred and 
nineteen votes against sixty-seven. 

Hastings was now confident of victory. It seemed, 
indeed, that he had reason to be so. The E/ohilla war 
was, of all his measures, that which his accusers might 
with greatest advantage assail. It had been con- 
demned by the Court of Directors. It had been con- 
demned by the House of Commons. It had been 
condemned by Mr. Dundas, who had since become the 
chief minister of the Crown for Indian affairs. Tet 
Burke, having chosen this strong ground, had been 
completely defeated on it. That, having failed here, 
he should succeed on any point, was generally thought 
impossible. It was rumoured at the clubs and coffee- 
houses, that one, or perhaps two more charges would 



WARREN HASTINGS. 153 

be brought forward; that if, on those charges, the 
sense of the House of Commons should be against 
impeachment, the Opposition would let the matter 
drop, that Hastings would be immediately raised to 
the peerage, decorated with the star of the Bath, 
sworn of the privy council, and invited to lend the 
assistance of his talents and experience to the India 
Board. Lord Thurlow, indeed, some months before^ 
had spoken with contempt of the scruples which pre- 
vented Pitt from calling Hastings to the House of 
Lords ; and had even said that, if the Chancellor of the 
Exchequer was afraid of the Commons, there wa& 
nothing to prevent the Keeper of the Great Seal from 
taking the royal pleasure about a patent of peerage. 
The very title was chosen. Hastings was to be Lord 
Daylesford. For, through all changes of scene and 
changes of fortune, remained unchanged his attach- 
ment to the spot which had witnessed the greatness 
and the fall of his family, and which had borne so^ 
great a part in the first dreams of his young ambition. 
But in a very few days these fair prospects were 
overcast. On the thirteenth of June, Mr. Fox brought 
forward, with great ability and eloquence, the charge 
respecting the treatment of Cheyte Sing. Francis 
followed on the same side. The friends of Hastings 
were in high spirits when Pitt rose. "With his usual 
abundance and felicity of language, the Minister gave 



154 WARREN HASTINGS. 

his opinion on the case. lie maintained that tlse 
Governor- General was justified in calling on the Raj;.!! 
of Benares for pecuniary assistance, and in imposing a 
fine when that assistance was contumaciously withheld. 
He also thought that the conduct of the Governor- 
General during the insurrection had been distinguished 
by ability and presence of mind. He censured, with 
great bitterness, the conduct of Francis, both in India 
and in Parliament, as most dishonest and malignant. 
The necessary inference from Pitt's arguments seemed 
to be that Hastings ought to be honourably acquitted ; 
and both the friends and the opponents of the Minister 
expected from him a declaration to that efi'ect. To the 
astonishment of all parties, he concluded by saying 
that, though he thought it right in Hastings to fine 
Cheyte Sing for contumacy, jei the amount of the fine 
was too great for the occasion. On this ground, and 
on this ground alone, did Mr, Pitt, applauding every 
other part of the conduct of Hastings with regard to 
Benares, declare that he should vote in favour of Mr. 
Fox's motion. 

The House was thunderstruck ; and it well might be 
so. For the' wrong done to Cheyte Sing, even had it 
been as flagitious as Fox and Francis contended, was a 
trifle when compared with the horrors which had been 
inflicted on Rohilcund. But if Mr. Pitt's view of the 
c&se of Cheyte Sing were correct, there was no ground 



WARREN HASTINGS. 155 

for an impeaclimeiit, or even for a vote of censure. If 
the offence of Hastings was really no more than this, 
that, having a right to impose a mulct, the amount of 
which mulct was not defined, but was left to be settled 
by his discretion, he had, not for his own advantage, ■ 
but for that of the state, demanded too much, was this 
an offence which required a criminal proceeding of the 
highest solemnity, a criminal proceeding to which, 
during sixty years, no public functionary had been 
subjected ? We can see, we think, in what way a man 
of sense and integrity might have been induced to t^ke 
any course respecting Hastings, except the course 
which Mr. Pitt took. Such a man might have thought 
a great example necessary, for the prevention of in- 
justice, and for the vindicating of the national honour, 
and might, on that ground, have voted for impeach- 
ment both on the Rohilla charge, and on the Benares 
charge. Such a man might have thought that the 
offences of Hastings had been atoned for by great 
services, and might, on that ground, have voted 
against the impeachment, on both charges. With 
great diffidence, we give it as our opinion, that the 
most correct course would, on the whole, have been to 
impeach on the Rohilla charge, and to acquit on the 
Benares charge. Had the Benares charge appeared to 
us in the same light in which it appeared to Mr. Pitt, 
we should, without liesitation, have vot«d for acquittal 



156 WARREN HASTINGS. 

on that cliarge. The one course which it is incon- 
ceivable that any man of a tenth part of Mr. Pitt's 
abilities can have honestly taken was the course which 
he took. He acquitted Hastings on the E-ohilla 
charge. He softened down the Benares charge till it 
became no charge at all ; and then he pronounced that 
it contained matter for impeachment. 

Nor must it be forgotten that the principal reason 
assigned by the ministry for not impeaching Hastings 
on account of the E-ohilla war was this, that the 
delinquencies of the early part of his administration 
had been atoned for by the excellence of the later part. 
Was it not most extraordinary that men who had held 
this language could afterwards vote that the later part 
of his administration furnished matter for no less than 
twenty articles of impeachment? They first repre- 
sented the conduct of Hastings in 1780 and 1781 as so 
highly meritorious that, like works of supererogation 
in the Catholic theology, it ought to be efficacious for 
the cancelling of former offences ; and they then prose- 
cuted him for his conduct in 1780 and 1781. 

The general astonishment was the greater, because, 
only twenty-four hours before, the members on whom 
the minister could depend had received the usual notes 
from the Treasury, begging them to be in their places 
and to vot-e against Mr, Fox's motion. It was asserted 
by Mr. Hastings, that, early on the morning of the 



WARREN HASTINGS. 157 

very day on whicli the debate took place, Dundaa 
called on Pitt, -w^oke him, and was closeted with him 
many hours. The result of this conference was a 
determination to give up the late Governor- General to 
the vengeance of the Opposition. It was impossible 
even for the most powerful minister to carry all his 
followers with him in so strange a course. Several 
persons high in office, the Attorney- General, Mr. Gren- 
ville, and Lord Mulgrave, divided against Mr. Pitt. 
But the devoted adherents who stood by the head of 
the government without asking questions, were suffi- 
ciently numerous to turn the scale. A hundred and 
nineteen members voted for Mr. Fox's motion; seventy- 
nine against it. Dundas silently followed Pitt. 

That good and great man, the late "William "Wilber- 
force, often related the events of this remarkable 
night. He described the amazement of the House, and 
the bitter reflections which were muttered against the 
Prime Minister by some of the habitual supporters of 
government. Pitt himseK appeared to feel that this 
conduct required some explanation. He left the 
Treasury bench, sat for some time next to Mr. "Wilber- 
force, and very earnestly declared that he had found 
it impossible, as a man of conscience, to stand any 
longer by Hastings. The business, he said, was too 
bad. Mr. Wilberforce, we are bound to add, fully, 
believed that his friend was sincere, and that the 



158 WABREN HASTINGS. 

suspicions to wMcli this mysterious affair gave rise 
were altogetlier unfounded. 

Those suspicions, indeed, were such, as it is painful 
to mention. The friends of Hastings, most of whom, 
it is to be observed, generally supported the adminis- 
tration, affirmed that the motive of Pitt and Dundas 
was jealousy. Hastings was personally a favourite 
with the King. He was the idol of the East India 
Company and of its servants. If he were absolved by 
the Commons, seated among the Lords, admitted to the 
Board of Control, closely allied with the strong-minded 
and imperious Thurlow, was it not almost certain that 
he would soon draw to himseK the entire management 
of Eastern affairs ? Was it not possible that he might 
become a formidable rival in the cabinet? It had 
probably got abroad that very singular communications 
had taken place between Thurlow and Major Scott, 
and that, if the First Lord of the Treasury was afraid 
to recommend Hastings for a peerage, the Chancellor 
was ready to take the responsibility of that step on 
himself. Of all ministers, Pitt was the least likely to 
submit with patience to such an encroachment on hif< 
functions. If the Commons impeached Hastings, all 
danger was at an end. The proceeding, however ii. 
might terminate, would probably last some years, lii 
the meantime, the accused person would be excluded 
from honours and public employments, and could 



WARIiKN HAftTi>:-;s. 



159 



scarcely yenture even to pay Ids duty al ouiiit. Such 
vrere the motives attributed by a great part of the 
public to the young minister, whose ruling passion was 
generally believed to be avarice of power. 

The prorogation soon interrupted the discussions 
respecting Hastings. In the following year, those 
discussions were resumed. The charge touching the 
spoliation of the Begums was brought forward by 
Sheridan, in a speech which was so imperfectly re- 
ported that it may be said to be wholly lost, but which 
was, without doubt, the most elaborately brilliant of all 
the productions of his ingenious mind. The impression 
which it produced was such as has never been equalled 
He sat down, not merely amidst cheering, but amidst 
the loud clapping of hands, in which the Lords below 
the bar and the strangers in the gallery joined. The 
excitement of the House was such that no other 
speaker could obtain a hearing; and the debate was 
adjourned. The ferment spread fast through the town. 
Within f our-and-twenty hours Sheridan was o:ffered a 
thousand pounds for the copyright of his speech, if he 
would himself correct it for the press. The impression 
made by this remarkable display of eloquence on severe 
and experienced critics, whose discernment may be 
supposed to have been quickened by emulation, was 
deep and permanent. Mr. "Windham, twenty years 
later, said that the speech deserved all its fame, and 



160 WARREN HASTINGS. 

was, in spite of some faults of taste, such as were 
seldom wanting either in tlie literary or in the par- 
liamentary performances of Sheridan, the finest that 
had been delivered within the memory of man. Mr. 
Fox, about the same time, being asked by the late 
Lord Holland, what was the best speech ever made in 
the House of Commons, assigned the first place, with- 
out hesitation, to the great oration of Sheridan on the 
Oude charge. 

"When the debate was resumed, the tide ran so 
strongly against the accused that his friends were 
coughed and scraped down. Pitt declared himself for 
Sheridan's motion ; and the question was carried by a 
hundred and seventy-five votes against sixty-eight. 

The Opposition, flushed with victory and strongly 
supported by the public sympathy, proceeded to bring 
forward a succession of charges relating chiefly to 
pecuniary transactions. The friends of Hastings were 
discouraged, and, having now no hope of being able to 
avert an impeachment, were not very strenuous in their 
exertions. At length the House, having agreed to 
twenty articles of charge, directed Burke to go before 
the Lords, and to impeach the late Governor- General 
of High Crimes and Misdemeanours. Hastings was 
at the same time arrested by the Serjeant-at-Arms, and 
carried to the Bar of the Peers. 

The session was now within ten days of its close. It 



WARREN HASTINGS. 161 

■was, therefore, impossible that any progress coiJd be 
made in the trial till the next year. Hastings waa 
admitted to bail ; and further proceedings were post- 
poned till the Houses should re-assemble. 

When Parliament met in the f oUoTring winter, the- 
Commons proceeded to elect a committee for manag- 
ing the impeachment. Burke stood at the head ; and 
with him were associated most of the leading members 
of the Opposition. But when the name of Francis 
was read a fierce contention arose. It was said that 
Francis and Hastings were notoriously on bad terms, 
that they had been at feud during many years, that on 
one occasion their mutual aversion had impelled them 
to seek each other's lives, and that it would be im- 
proper and indelicate to select a private enemy to be a 
public accuser. It was urged on the other side with 
great force, particularly by Mr. Windham', that im- 
partiality, though the first duty of a judge, had never 
been reckoned among the qualities of an advocate ; that 
in the ordinary administration of criminal justice 
among the English, the aggrieved party, the v^ry last 
person who ought to be admitted into the jury-box, la- 
the prosecutor ; that what was wanted in a manager 
was, not that he should be free from bias, but that he 
should be able, well informed, energetic, and active. 
The ability and information of Francis were admitted ; 
aj',d the very animosity with which he was reproached, 
P— 1 



162 WARREN HASTINGS, 

wlietlier a virtue or a vice, was at least a pledge for 
liis energy and activity. It seems difficult to refute 
these arguments. But the inveterate hatred borne by 
Francis to Hastings had excited general disgust. The 
House decided that Francis should not be a manager. 
Pitt voted with the majority, Dundas with the 
minority. 

In the meantime, the preparations for the trial had 
proceeded rapidly ; and on the thirteenth of February, 
1788, the sittings of the Court commenced. There 
have been spectacles more dazzling to the eye, more 
gorgeous with jewellery and cloth of gold, more 
attractive to grown-up children, than that which was 
then exhibited at Westminster ; but, perhaps, there 
never was a spectacle so well calculated to strike a 
highly cultivated, a reflecting, an imaginative mind. 
All the various kinds of interest which belong to the 
near and to the distant, to the present and to the past, 
were collected on one spot and in one hour. All the 
talents and all the accomplishments which are de- 
veloped by liberty and civilisation were now displayed, 
with every advantage that could be derived both from 
co-operation and from contrast. Every step in the 
proceedings carried the mind either backward, through 
many troubled centuries, to the days when the founda- 
tions of our constitution were laid ; or far away, over 
boundless seas and deserts, to dusky nations living 



WARREN HASTINGS. 163 

under strange stars, worshipping strange gods, and 
Y/riting strange characters from right to left. The 
High Court of Parliament was to sit, according to 
forms handed down from the days of the Plantagenets, 
on an Englishman accused of exercising tyranny over 
the lord of the holy city of Benares, and over the 
ladies of the princely house of Oude, 

The place was worthy of such a trial. It was the 
great hall of William Rufus, the hall which had re- 
sounded with acclamations at the inauguration of 
thirty kings, the hall which had witnessed the just 
sentence of Bacon and the just absolution of Somers, 
the hall where the eloquence of Strafford had for a 
moment awed and melted a victorious party inflamed 
with just resentment, the hall where Charles had con- 
fronted the High Court of Justice with the placid 
courage which has half redeemed his fame. Neither 
military nor civil pomp was wanting. The avenues 
were lined with grenadiers. The streets were kept 
clear by cavalry. The peers, robed in gold and ermine, 
were marshalled by the heralds under Garter King-at- 
Arms. The judges, in their vestments of state, 
attended to give advice on points of law. Near a 
hundred and seventy Lords, three-fourths of the 
Upper House as the Upper House then was, walked 
in solemn order from their usual place of assembling 
to the tribunal. The junior Baron present led the 



164 WARREN HASTINGS. 

way, George Eliott, Lord Heathfield, recently en- 
nobled for Ms memorable defence of Gibraltar against 
the fleets and armies of France and Spain, The long 
procession was closed by the Duke of l^orfolk, Earl 
Marshal of the realm, by the great dignitaries, and by 
the brothers and sons of the King. Last of all came 
the Prince of Wales, conspicuous by his fine person 
and noble bearing. The grey old walls were hung 
with scarlet. The long galleries were crowded by an 
audience such as has rarely excited the fears or the 
emulation of an orator. There were gathered together, 
from all parts of a great, free, enlightened, and pros- 
perous empire, grace and female loveliness, wit and 
learning, the representatives of every science and of 
every art. There were seated round the Queen the 
fair-haired young daughters of the house of Brunswick. 
There the Ambassadors of great Kings and Common- 
wealths gazed with admiration on a spectacle which no 
other country in the world could present. There 
Siddons, in the prime of her majestic beauty, looked 
with emotion on a scene surpassing all the imitations 
of the stage. There the historian of the Roman 
Empire thought of the days when Cicero pleaded the 
cause of Sicily against Yerres, and when, before a 
Senate which still retained some show of freedom, 
Tacitus thundered against the oppressor of Africa. 
There were seen, side by side, the greatest painter and 



WAIiREX HASTINGS. 165 

the gi'catest scliolar of tlie age. Tlio spectacle had 
allured Reynolds from that easel which has preserved 
to us the thoughtful foreheads of so many writers and 
statesmen, and the sweet smiles of so many noble 
matrons. It had induced Parr to suspend his labours 
in that dark and profound mine from which he had 
extracted a vast treasure of erudition, a treasure too 
often buried in the earth, too often paraded with in- 
judicious and inelegant ostentation, but still precious, 
massive, and splendid. There appeared the voluptu- 
ous charms of her to whom the heir of the throne had 
in secret jjlightod his faith. There too was she, the 
beautiful mother of a beautiful race, the Saint Cecilia, 
whose delicate features, lighted up by love and music, 
art has rescued from a common decay. There were 
the members of that brilliant society which quoted, 
criticised, and exchanged rejDartees, under the rich 
peacock hangings of Mrs. Montague. And there 
the ladies whose lips, more persuasive than those of 
Fox himself, had carried the "Westminster election 
against palace and treasury, shone round Georgiana 
Duchess of Devonshire. 

The Serjeants made proclamation. Hastings ad- 
vanced to the bar, and bent his knee. The culprit 
was indeed not unworthy of that great presence. He 
had ruled an extensive and populous country, Lad 
made laws and treaties, had sent forth armies, had set 



166 WARREN HASTINGS. 

up and pulled down jprinces. And in his liigli place 
lie had so borne himseK, that all had feared him, that 
most had loved him-, and that hatred itself could 
deny him no title to glory, except virtue. He looked 
like a great man, and not like a bad man. A person 
small and emaciated, yet deriving dignity from a 
carriage which, while it indicated deference to the 
court, indicated also habitual seK-possession and self- 
respect, a high and intellectual forehead, a brow 
pensive, but not gloomy, a mouth of inflexible decision, 
a face pale and worn, but serene, on which was written, 
as legibly as under the picture in the council-chamber 
at Calcutta, Mens cequa in arduisy such was the 
aspect with which the great Proconsul presented liim- 
seK to his judges. 

His counsel accompanied him, men all of whom 
were afterwards raised by their talents and learning 
to the highest posts in their profession, the bold and 
strong-minded Law, afterwards Chief Justice of 
the King's Bench ; the more humane and eloquent 
Dallas, afterwards Chief Justice of the Common Pleas; 
and Plomer, who, near twenty years later, successfully 
conducted in the same high court the defence of 
Lord Melville, and subsequently became Yice-chan- 
eellor and Master of the Rolls. 

But neither the culprit nor his advocates attracted 
so much notice as the accusers. In the midst of the 



WAEREN- HASTINGS. 167 

bla/:6 of red drapery, a space had been fitted up with 
green benches and tables for the Commons. The 
managers, with Burke at their head, appeared in full 
dress. The collectors of gossip did not fail to remark 
that even Fox, generally so regardless of his appear- 
ance, had paid to the illustrious tribunal the compli- 
ment of wearing a bag and sword. Pitt had refused 
to be one of the conductors of the impeachment ; and 
his commanding, copious, and sonorous eloquence was 
wanting to that great muster of various talents. Age 
and blindness had unfitted Lord North for the duties 
of a public prosecutor ; and his friends were left with- 
out the help of his excellent sense, his tact, and his 
urbanity. But in spite of the absence of these two 
distinguished members of the Lower House, the box 
in which the managers stood contained an array of 
speakers such as perhaps had not appeared together 
since the great age of Athenian eloquence. There 
were Fox and Sheridan, the English Demosthenes and 
the English Hyperides. There was Burke, ignorant, 
indeed, or negligent of the art of adapting his 
reasonings and his style to the capacity and taste of 
his hearers, but in amplitude of comprehension and 
richness of imagination superior to every orator, 
ancient or modern. There, with eyes reverentially- 
fixed on Burke, appeared the finest gentleman of tl\« 
age, his form developed by every manly exercise, his 



168 WAimEN HASTINGS. 

face beaming with intelligence and spirit, the ingenious, 
the chivalrous, the high-souled Windham. Nor, 
though surrounded by such men, did the youngest 
manager pass unnoticed. At an age when most of 
those who distinguish themselves in life are still con- 
tending for prizes and fellowships at college, he had 
won for himself a conspicuous place in parliament. 
No advantage of fortune or connection was wanting 
that could set off to the height his splendid talents 
and his unblemished honour. At twenty-three he had 
been thought worthy to be ranked with the veteran 
statesmen who appeared as the delegates of the British 
Commons, at the bar of the British nobility. All who 
stood at that bar, save him alone, are gone, culprit, 
advocates, accusers. To the generation which is now 
in the vigour of life, he is the sole representative of a 
great age which has passed away. But those who, 
within the last ten years, have listened with delight, 
till the morning sun shone on the tapestries of the 
House of Lords, to the lofty and animated eloquence of 
Charles Earl Grey, are able to form some estimate of 
the powers of a race of men among whom he was not 
the foremost. 

The charges and the answers of Hastings were first 
read. The ceremony occupied two whole days, and 
was rendered less tedious than it would otherwise have 
been by the silver voice and just emphasis of Oowper, 



WARREX HASTINGS. 169 

the clerk of the com- 1, a near relation of the amiable 
poet. On the third day Burke rose. Four sittings 
were occupied by his opening' speech, which was in- 
tended to be a general introduction to all the charges. 
With an exuberance of thought and a splendour of 
diction which more than satisfied the highly raised 
expectation of the audience, he described the character 
and institutions of the natives of India, recounted the 
circumstances in which the Asiatic empire of Britain 
had originated, and set forth the constitution of the 
Company and of the English Presidencies. Having 
thus attempted to communicate to his hearers an idea 
of Eastern society as vivid as that which existed in his 
own mind, he proceeded to arraign the administration 
of Hastings as systematically conducted in defiance of 
morality and public law. The energy and pathos of 
the great orator extorted expressions of unwonted 
admiration from the stern and hostile Chancellor, and, 
for a moment, seemed to pierce even the resolute heart 
of the defendant. The ladies in the galleries, unaccus- 
tomed to such displays of eloquence, excited by the 
solemnity of the occasion, and perhaps not unwilling 
to display their taste and sensibility, were in a state of 
uncontrollable emotion. Handkerchiefs were pulled 
out; smelling bottles were handed round; hysterical 
sobs and screams were heard : and Mrs. Sheridan was 
carried out in a fit. At length the orator concluded. 



170 WAEIiEN HASTINGS. 

K/aising Ms voice till tlio old arches of Irish oak 
resounded, "Therefore," said he, "hath it with all 
confidence been ordered, hj the Commons of Great 
Britain, that I impeach "Warren Hastings of high 
crimes and misdemeanours. I impeach him in the 
name of the Commons House of Parliament, whose 
trust he has betrayed. I impeach him in the name of 
the English nation, whose ancient honour he has sullied. 
I impeach him in the name of the people of India, 
whose rights he has trodden under foot, and whose 
country he has turned into a desert. Lastly, in the 
name of human nature itself, in the name of both sexes, 
in the name of every age, in the name of every rank, I 
impeach the common enemy and oppressor of all ! " 

"When the deep murmur of various emotions had 
subsided, Mr. Pox rose to address the Lords respecting 
the course of proceeding to be followed. The wish of 
the accusers was that the Court would bring to a close 
the investigation of the first charge before the second 
was opened. The wish of Hastings and of his counsel 
was that the managers should open all the charges, and 
produce aU the evidence for the prosecution, before the 
defence began. The Lords retired to their own House 
to consider the question. The Chancellor took the 
side of Hastings. Lord Loughborough, who was now 
in opposition, supported the demand of thei managers. 
The division showed which way the inclination of the 



WARRElSr HASTINGS. 171 

tribuual leaned, A majority of near three to one 
decided in favour of tlie course for whicli Hastings 
contended. 

"When the Court sat again, Mr. Fox, assisted by Mr. 
Grey, opened the charge respecting Cheyte Sing, and 
several days were spent in reading papers and hearing 
witnesses. The next article was that relating to the 
Princesses of Oude. The conduct of this part of the 
case was entrusted to Sheridan. The curiosity of the 
public to hear him was unbounded. His sparkling 
and highly finished declamation lasted two days ; but 
the Hall was crowded to suffocation during the whole 
time. It was said that fifty guineas had been paid for 
a single ticket. Sheridan, when he concluded, con- 
trived, with a knowledge of stage effect which his 
father might have envied, to sink back, as if exhausted, 
into the arms of Burke, who hugged him with the 
energy of generous admiration. 

June was now far advanced. The session could not 
last much longer; and the progress which had been 
made in the impeachment was not very satisfactory. 
There were twenty charges. On two only of these had 
even the case for the prosecution been heard ; and it 
was now a year since Hastings had been admitted tc 
bail. 

The interest taken by the public in the trial was 
great when the Court began to sit, and rose to the 



172 vVAEEEN HASTINGS. 

height when Sheridan spoke on the charge relating to 
the Begums. From that time the excitement went 
down fast. The spectacle had lost the attraction of 
novelty. The great displays of rhetoric were over. 
What was behind was not of a nature to entice men of 
letters from their books in the morning, or to tempt 
ladies who had left the masquerade at two to be out of 
bed before eight. There remained examinations and 
cross examinations. There remained statements of 
accounts, there remained the reading of papers, filled 
with words unintelligible to English ears, with lacs and 
crores, zemindars and aumils, sunnuds and perwannahs, 
jaghires and nuzzurs. There remained bickerings, not 
always carried on with the best taste or with the best 
temper, between the managers of the impeachment and 
the counsel for the defence, particularly between Mr. 
Burke and Mr. Law. There remained the endless 
marches and countermarches of the peers between their 
House and the Hall : for as often as a point of law was 
to be discussed, their Lordships retired to discuss it 
apart ; and the consequence was, as a Peer wittily said, 
that the judges walked and the trial stood still. 

It is to be added that, in the spring of 1788, when 
the trial commenced, no important question, either of 
domestic or foreign policy, occupied the public mind. 
The proceeding in TVestminster Hall, therefore, 
naturally attracted most of the attention of Parliament 



WARREN HASTINGS. 173 

and of the country. It was tlie one great event of 
that season. But in the following year the King's 
illness, the debates on the Regency, the expectation of 
a change of ministry, completely diverted public atten- 
tion from Indian affairs ; and within a fortnight after 
George the Third had returned thanks in St. Paul's for 
his recovery, the States- General of France met at 
YersaiHes. In the midst of the agitation produced by 
these events, the impeachment was for a time almost 
forgotten. 

The trial in the Hall went on languidly. In the 
session of 1788, when the proceedings had the interest 
of novelty, and when the Peers had little other business 
before them, only thirty-five days were given to the 
impeachment. In 1789 the Regency BiU occupied the 
Upper House till the session was far advanced. When 
the King recovered, the circuits were beginning. The 
judges left town ; the Lords waited for the return of 
the oracles of jurisprudence ; and the consequence was 
that during the whole year, only seventeen days were 
given to the case of Hastings. It was clear that the 
matter would be protracted to a length unprecedented 
in the annals of criminal law. 

In truth, it is impossible to deny that impeachment,, 
though it is a fine ceremony, and though it may have 
been useful in the seventeenth century, is not a pro- 
ceeding from which much good can now be expected. 



174 WAF.KEN HASTixaa. 

Wii-i lever confidence may be placed in tlie decision of 
the Peers, on an appeal arising out of ordinary litiga- 
tion, it is certain that no man has the least confidence 
in their impartiality when a great public functionary, 
charged with a great state crime, is brought to their bar. 
They are all politicians. There is hardly one among 
them whose vote on an impeachment may not be con- 
fidently predicted before a witness has been examined ; 
and, even if it were possible to rely on their justice, 
they would still be quite unfit to try such a cause as 
that of Hastings. They sit only during haK the year. 
They have to transact much legislative and much 
judicial business. The law-lords whose advice is 
required to guide the unlearned majority, are em- 
ployed daily in administering justice elsewhere. It is 
impossible, therefore, that during a busy session, the 
Upper House should give more than a few days to an 
impeachment. To expect that their Lordships would 
give up partridge-shooting, in order to bring the 
greatest delinquent to speedy justice, or to relieve 
accused innocence by speedy acquittal, would be un- 
reasonable indeed. A well constituted tribunal, sitting 
regularly six days in the week, and nine hours in the 
day, would have brought the trial of Hastings to a 
close in less than three months. The Lords had not 
fijiished their work in seven years. 

The result ceased to be matter of doubt, from the 



WAEREN HASTINGS. 175 

time when the Lords resolTed that they would be 
guided by the rules of evidence which are received in 
the inferior courts of the realm. Those rules, it is 
well known, exclude much information which would be 
quite sufficient to determine the conduct of any reason- 
able man, in the most important transactions of private 
life. These rules, at every assizes, save scores of 
culprits whom judges, jury, and spectators, firmly 
believe to be guilty. But when those rules were 
rigidly applied to offences committed many years 
before, at the distance of many thousands of miles, 
conviction was, of course, out of the question. We do 
not blame the accused and his counsel for availing 
themselves of every legal advantage in order to obtain 
an acquittal. But it is clear that an acquittal so ob- 
tained cannot be pleaded in bar of the judgment of 
history. 

Several attempts were made by the friends of 
Hastings to put a stop to the trial. In 1789 they 
proposed a vote of censure upon Burke, for some 
violent language which he had used respecting the 
death of ISTuncomar and the connection between 
Hastings and Impey. Burke was then unpopular in 
the last degree both with the House and with the 
country. The asperity and indecency of some ex- 
pressions which he had used during the debates on the 
Regency, had annoyed even his warmest friends. The 



176 WAEREN HASTINGS. 

vote of censure was carried ; and those who had mored 
it hoped that the managers would resign in disgust. 
Burke was deeply hurt. But his zeal for what he con- 
sidered as the cause of justice and mercy triumphed 
over his personal feelings. He received the censure of 
tiie House with dignity and meekness, and declared 
that no personal mortification or humiliation should 
induce him to flinch from the sacred duty which he 
had undertaken. 

In the following year the Parliament was dissolved : 
and the friends of Hastings entertained a hope that 
the new House of Commons might not be disposed to 
go on with the impeachment. They began by main- 
taining that the whole proceeding was terminated by 
the dissolution. Defeated on this point, they made a 
direct motion that the impeachment should be dropped ; 
but they were defeated by the combined forces of the 
Government and the Opposition. It was, however, 
resolved that, for the sake of expedition, many of the 
articles should be withdrawn. In truth, had not some 
such measure been adopted, the trial would have lasted 
till the defendant was in his grave. 

At length, in the spring of 1795, the decision was 
pronounced, near eight years after Hastings had been 
brought by the Serjeant-at-Arms of the Commons to 
the Bar of the Lords. On the last day of this great 
procedure the public curiosity, long suspended, seemed 



WARREN HASTINGS. 177 

to be revived. Anxiety about the judgment there 
could be none ; for it had been fully ascertained that 
there was a great majority for the defendant. Never- 
theless, many wished to see the pageant, and the Hall 
was as much crowded as on the first day. But those 
who, having been present on the first day, now bore a 
part in the proceedings of the last, were few; and 
most of those few were altered men. 

As Hastings himseK said, the arraignment had taken 
place before one generation, and the judgment was 
pronoimeed by another. The spectator could not look 
at the Woolsack, or at the red benches of the Peers, or 
at the green benches of the Commons, without seeing 
something that reminded him of the instability of all 
human things, of the instability of power and fame 
and life, of the more lamentable instability of friend- 
ship. The great seal was borne before Lord Lough- 
borough, who, when the trial commenced, was a fierce 
opponent of Mr. Pitt's government, and who was now 
a member of that government, while Thurlow, who 
presided in the court when it first sat, estranged from 
all his old allies, sat scowling among the junior barons. 
Of about a hundred and sixty nobles who walked in 
the procession on the first day, sixty had been laid in 
their family vaults. Still more affecting must have 
been the sight of the managers' box. What had 
become of that fair fellowship, so closely bound 



178 WARREN HASTINGS. 

together by public and private ties, so resplendent 
with, every talent and aecomplislunent ? It bad been 
scattered by calamities more bitter than the bitterness 
of death. The great chiefs were still living, and still 
in the full vigour of their genius. But their friendship 
was at an end. It had been violently and publicly 
dissolved, with tears and stormy reproaches. If those 
men, once so dear to each other, were now compelled 
to meet for the purpose of managing the impeachment, 
they met as strangers whom public business had 
brought together, and behaved to each other with cold 
and distant civility. Burke had in his vortex whirled 
away "Windham ; Fox had been followed by Sheridan 
and Grey. 

Only twenty-nine Peers voted. Of these, only six 
found Hastings guilty on the charges relating to 
Cheyte Sing and to the Begums. On other charges, 
the majority in his favour was still greater. On some 
he was unanimously absolved. He was then called to 
the Bar, was informed from the Woolsack that the 
Lords had acquitted him, and was solemnly discharged. 
He bowed respectfully and retired. 

We have said that the decision had been fully 
expected. It was also generally approved. At the 
commencement of the trial there had been a strong and 
indeed unreasonable feeling against Hastings. At the 
closn of the trial there was a feeling equally strong 



WARREN HASTINGS. 179 

and equally unreasonable in his favour. One cause of 
the change was, no doubt, what is commonly called the 
fickleness of the multitude, but what seems to us to be 
merely the general law of human nature. Both in 
individuals and in masses violent excitement is always 
followed by remission, and often by reaction. We are 
all inclined to depreciate whatever we have overpraised, 
and, on the other hand, to show undue indulgence 
where we have shown undue rigour. It was thus in 
the case of Hastings. The length of his trial, more- 
over, made him an object of compassion. It was 
thought, and not without reason, that, even if he was 
guilty, he was still an ill-used man, and that an 
impeachment of eight years was more than a sufficient 
punishment. It was also felt that, though, in ordinary 
course of criminal law, a defendant is not allowed to 
set off his good actions against his crimes, a great 
political cause should be tried on different principles, 
and that a man who had governed an empire during 
thirteen years might have done some very reprehensible 
things, and yet might be on the whole deserving of 
rewards and honours rather than of fine and imprison- 
ment. The press, an instrument neglected by the 
prosecutors, was used by Hastings and his friends with 
great effect. Every ship, too, that arrived from 
Madras or Bengal, brought a cuddy full of his 
admirers. Every gentleman from India spoke of the 



180 WAHEEN HASTINGS. 

late Governor- General as having deserved better, and 
having been treated worse, than any man living. The 
effect of this testimony unanimously given by all 
persons who knew the East, was naturally very great. 
Retired members o£ the Indian services, civil and 
military, were settled in all comers of the kingdom. 
Each of them was, of course, in his own little circle, 
regarded as an oracle on an Indian question ; and they 
were, with scarcely one exception, the zealous advocates 
of Hastings. It is to be added, that the numerous 
addresses to the late Governor- General, which his 
friends in Bengal obtained from the natives and 
transmitted to England, made a considerable impres- 
sion. To these addresses we attach little or no 
importance. That Hastings was beloved by the people 
whom he governed is true ; but the eulogies of pundits, 
zemindars, Mahommedan doctors, do not prove it to be 
true. For an English collector or judge would have 
found it easy to induce any native who could write to 
sign a panegyric on the most odious ruler that ever 
was in India. It was said that at Benares, the very 
place at which the acts set forth in the first article of 
impeachment had been committed, the natives had 
erected a temple to Hastings ; and this story excited a 
strong sensation in England. Burke's observations on 
the apotheosis were admirable. He saw no reason for 
astonishment, he said, in the incident which had been 



WARREN HASTINGS. 181 

represented as so striking. He knew sometklng of the 
mythology of the Brahmins. He knew that as they 
worshipped some gods from love, so they worshipped 
others from fear. He knew that they erected shrines, 
not only to the benignant daities of- light and plenty, 
but also to the fiends who preside over small-pox and 
murder; nor did he at all dispute the claim of Mr. 
Hastings to be admitted into such a Pantheon. This 
reply has always struck us as one of the finest that 
ever was made in Parliament. It is a grave and 
forcible argument, decorated by the most brilliant wit 
and fancy. 

Hastings was, however, safe. But in everything, 
except character, he would have been far better off if, 
when first impeached, he had at once pleaded guilty, 
and paid a fine of fifty thousand pounds. He was a 
ruined man. The legal expenses of his defence had 
been enormous. The expenses which did not appear in 
his attorney's bill were perhaps larger still. Great 
sums had been paid to Major Scott. Great sums had 
been laid out in bribing newspapers, rewarding pam- 
phleteers, and circulating tracts. Burke, so early as 
1790, declared in the House of Commons that twenty 
thousand pounds had been employed in corrupting the 
press. It is certain that no controversial weapon, 
from the gravest reasoning to the coarsest ribaldry, 
was left unemployed. Logan defended the accused 



182 '.VAR}IEN HASTINGS. 

Governor with great ability in prose. For the lovers 
of verse, the speeches of the managers were burlesqued 
in Simkin's letters. It is, we are afraid, indisputable 
that Hastings stooped so low as to court the aid of 
that malignant and filthy baboon John Williams, who 
called himseK Anthony Pasquin. It was necessary to 
subsidise such allies largely. The private hoards of 
Mrs. Hastings had disappeared. It is said that the 
banker to whom they had been intrusted had failed. 
Still if Hastings had practised strict economy, he 
would, after all his losses, have had a moderate com- 
petence ; but in the management of his private affairs 
he was imprudent. The dearest wish of his heart had 
always been to regain Daylesf ord. At length, in the 
very year in which his trial commenced, the wish was 
accomplished; and the domain, alienated more than 
seventy years before, returned to the descendant of its 
old lords. But the manor house was a ruin ; and the 
grounds round it had,, during many years, been utterly 
neglected. Hastings proceeded to build, to plant, to 
form a sheet of water, to excavate a grotto ; and before 
he was dismissed from the Bar of the House of Lords, 
he had expended more than forty thousand pounds in 
adorning his seat. 

The general feeling both of the directors and of the 
proprietors of the East India Company was that he had 
great claims on them, that his services to them had 



■^^ASEEN HASTINGS. 183 

been eminent, and that his misfortunes had been the 
effect of his zeal for their interest. His friends in 
Leadenhall Street proposed to reimburse him the costs 
of his trial, and to settle on him an annuity of five 
thousand pounds a year. But the consent of the Board 
of Control was necessary ; and at the head of the Board 
of Control was Mr. Dundas, -who had himself been a 
party to the impeachment, who had, on that account, 
been reviled with great bitterness by the adherents of 
Hastings, and who, therefore, was not in a very com- 
plying mood. He refused to consent to what the 
directors suggested. The directors remonstrated. A 
long controversy followed. Hastings, in the meantime, 
was reduced to such distress that he could hardly pay 
his weekly bills. At length a compromise was made. 
An annuity for life of four thousand pounds was 
settled on Hastings ; and in order to enable him to 
meet pressing demands, he was to receive ten years' 
annuity in advance. The Company was also permitted 
to lend him fifty thousand pounds, to be repaid by in- 
stalments without interest. This relief, though given 
in the most absurd manner, was sufficient to enable the 
retired Governor to live in comfort, and even in luxury, 
if he had been a skilful manager. But he was so care- 
less and profuse, and was more than once under the 
necessity of applying to the Company for assistance, 
which was liberally given. 



184 WAHREN HASTIls^GS. 

He had security and affluence, but not tlie power and 
dignity wliich, when he landed from India, he had 
reason to expect. He had then looked forward to a 
coronet, a red riband, a seat at the Council Board, an 
office at Whitehall. He was then only fifty-two, and 
might hope for many years of bodily and mental 
vigour. The case was widely different when he left 
the Bar of the Lords. He was now too old a man to 
turn his mind to a new class of studies and duties. He 
had no chance of receiving any mark of royal favour 
while Mr. Pitt remained in power ; and, when Mr. Pitt 
retired, Hastings was approaching his seventieth 
year. 

Once, and only once, after his acquittal, he interfered 
in politics ; and that interference was not much to his 
honour. In 1804 he exerted himseK strenuously to 
prevent Mr. Addington, against whom Fox and Pitt 
had combined, from resigning the Treasury. It is 
difficult to believe that a man, so able and energetic as 
Hastings, can have thought that, when Bonaparte was 
at Boulogne with a great army, the defence of our 
island could safely be intrusted to a ministry which did 
not contain a single person whom flattery could 
describe as a great statesman. It is also certain that, 
on the important question which had raised Mr. 
Addington to power, and on which he differed from 
both Fox and Pitt, Hastings, as might have been 



WARREN HASTINGS. 185 

expected, agreed with Fox and Pitt, and was decidedly 
opposed to Addington. Religious intolerance has- 
never been tlie vice of the Indian service, and certainly 
was not the vice of Hastings. But Mr. Addington 
had treated him with marked favour. Fox had been a 
principal manager of the impeachment. To Pitt it wa& 
owing that there had been an impeachment ; and Has- 
tings, we fear, was on this occasion guided by personal 
considerations, rather than by a regard to the public 
interest. 

The last twenty-four years of his life were chiefly 
passed at Daylesford. He amused himseK with em- 
bellishing his grounds, riding fine Arab horses, fatten- 
ing prize cattle, and trying to rear Indian animals and 
vegetables in England. He sent for seeds of a very 
fine custard-apple, from the garden of what had once 
been his own villa, among the green hedgerows of 
Allipore. He tried also to naturalise in Worcestershire 
the delicious leechee, almost the only fruit of Bengal 
which deserves to be regretted even amidst the plenty 
of Covent Garden. The Mogul emperors, in the time 
of their greatness, had in vain attempted to introduce 
in Hindostan the goat of the table-land of Thibet, 
whose down supplies the looms of Cashmere with the 
materials of the finest shawls. Hastings tried, with 
no better fortune, to rear a breed at Daylesford ; nor 
does he seem to have succeeded better with the cattle ol 



186 WAIir.EN HASTIK-G3. 

Eootan, wIjloso tails are in higli esteem as the best fans 
for brushing away the mosquitoes. 

Literature divided his attention with his conserva- 
tories and his menagerie. He had always loved books, 
and they were now necessary to him. Though not a poet, 
in any high sense of the word, he wrote neat and polished 
lines with great facility, and was fond of exercising 
this talent. Indeed, if we must speak out, he seems to 
have been more of a Trissotin than was to be expected 
from the powers of his mind, and from the great part 
which he had played in life. We are assured in these 
Memoirs that the first thing which he did in the morn- 
ing was to write a copy of verses. When the family 
and guests assembled, the poem made its appearance as 
regularly as the eggs and rolls; and Mr. Gleig requires 
us to believe that, if from any accident Hastings came 
to the breakfast-table without one of his charming 
performances in his hand, the omission was felt by all 
as a grievous disappointment. Tastes differ widely. 
For ourselves, we must say that, however good the break- 
fast at Daylesf ord may have been (and we are assured 
that the tea was of the most aromatic flavour, and that 
neither tongue nor venison-pasty was wanting), we 
should have thought the reckoning high if we had been 
forced to earn our repast by listening every day to a 
new madrigal or sonnet composed by our host. We 
are glad, however, that Mr. Gleig has preserved this 



WABHEN HASTINGS. 187 

little feature of cliaracter, thougli we think it by uo 
means a beauty. It is good to be often reminded of 
the inconsistency of human nature, and to learn to look 
without wonder or disgust on the weaknesses which 
are found in the strongest minds. Dionysius in old 
times, Frederic in the last century, with capacity and 
vigour equal to the conduct of the greatest affairs, 
united all the little vanities and affectations of pro- 
vincial blue-stockings. These great examples may 
console the admirers of Hastings for the affliction of 
seeing him reduced to the level of the Hayleys and 
Sewards. 

When Hastings had passed many years in retirement, 
and had long outlived the common age of men, he 
again became for a short time an object of general 
attention. In 1813 the charter of the East India 
Company was renewed; and much discussion about 
Indian affairs took place in Parliament. It was deter- 
mined to examine witnesses at the Bar of the Com- 
mons ; and Hastings was ordered to attend. He had 
appeared at that Bar once before. It was when he 
read his answer to the charges which Burke had laid 
on the table. Since that time twenty-seven years had 
elapsed; public feeling had undergone a complete 
change ; the nation had now forgotten his faults, and 
remembered only his services. The reappearance, too, 
of a man who had been among the most distinguished 



188 WAEREN HASTINGS. 

Gf a generation that had passed away, who now be- 
longed to history, and who seemed to have risen from 
the dead, could not but produce a solemn and pathetic 
effect. The Commons received him with acclamations, 
ordered a chair to be set for him, and, when he retired, 
rose and uncovered. There were, indeed, a few who 
did not sympathise with the general feeling. One or 
two of the managers of the impeachment were present. 
They sate in the same seats which they had occupied 
when they had been thanked for the services which 
they had rendered in Westminster Hall : for, by the 
courtesy of the House, a member who has been thanked 
in his place is considered as having a right always to 
occupy that place. These gentlemen were not disposed to 
admit that they had employed several of the best years 
of their lives in persecuting an innocent man. They 
accordingly kept their seats and pulled their hats over 
their brows ; but the exceptions only made the prevail- 
ing enthusiasm more remarkable. The Lords received 
the old man with similar tokens of respect. The 
University of Oxford conferred on him the degree of 
Doctor of Laws; and, in the Sheldonian Theatre, 
the undergraduates welcomed him with tumultuous 
cheering. 

These marks of public esteem were soon followed by 
marks of royal favour. Hastings was sworn of the 
Privy Council, and was admitted to a long private 



WARREN HASTINGS. i89 

audience of the Prince Regent, who treated him very 
graciously. "When the Emperor of Russia and the 
King of Prussia visited England, Hastings appeared 
in their train both at Oxford, and in the Guildhall of 
London, and, though surrounded by a crowd of princes 
and great warriors, was everywhere received with 
marks of respect and admiration. He was presented 
by the Prince Regent both to Alexander and to 
Frederick William ; and his royal highness went so far 
as to declare in public that honours far higher than a 
seat in the Privy Council were due, and would soon be 
paid, to the man who had saved the British dominions 
in Asia. Hastings now confidently expected a peerage ; 
]3ut, from some unexplained cause, he was again dis- 
appointed. 

He lived about four years longer, in the enjoyment 
of good spirits, of faculties not impaired to any painful 
or degrading extent, and of health such as is rarely 
enjoyed by those who attain such an age. At length, 
on the twenty-second of August, 1818, in the eighty- 
sixth year of his ago, he met death with the same 
tranquil and decorous fortitude which he had opposed 
to all the trials of his various and eventful life. 

With aU his faults, and they were neither few nor 
small, only one cemetery was worthy to contain his 
remains. In that temple of silence and reconciliation, 
where the enmities of twenty generations lie buried, in 



190 "WARREN HASTINGS. 

the Great Abbey which has during many ages afforded 
a quiet resting-place to those whose minds and bodies 
have been shattered by the contentions of the Great 
Hall, the dust of the illustrious accused should have 
mingled with the dust of the illustrious accusers. This 
was not to be. Tet the place of interment was not ill 
chosen. Behind the chancel of the parish church of 
Daylesford, in earth which already held the bones 
of many chiefs of the house of Hastings, was laid the 
coffin of the greatest man who has ever borne that 
ancient and widely extended name. On that very spot, 
probably, fourscore years before, the little Warren, 
meanly clad and scantily fed, had played with the 
children of the ploughmen. Even then his young 
mind had resolved plans which might be called 
romantic. Tet, however romantic, it is not likely that 
they had been so strange as the truth. Not only had 
the poor orphan retrieved the fallen fortunes of his 
line ; not only had he re-purchased the old lands, and 
rebuilt the old dwelling ; he had preserved and extended 
an empire. He had founded a polity. He had adminis- 
tered government and war with more than the capacity 
of Bjichelieu. He had patronised learning with the 
judicious liberality of Cosmo. He had been attacked 
by the most formidable combination of enemies that 
ever sought the destruction of a single victim; and 
over that combination, after a struggle of ten years, he 



V7ART^EN ILASTINGS. 191 

had triumplied. He had at length gone down to his 
grave in the fulness of age, in peace after so many 
troubles, in honour after so much obloquy. 

Those who look on his character without favour or 
malevolence will pronounce that, in the two great 
elements of all social virtue, in respect for the rights of 
others, and in sympathy for the sufferings of others, 
he was deficient. His principles were somewhat lax. 
His heart was somewhat hard. But though we cannot 
with truth describe him either as a righteous or as a 
merciful ruler, we cannot regard without admiration 
the amplitude and fertility of his intellect, his rare 
talents for command, for administration, and for con- 
troversy, his dauntless courage, his honourable poverty, 
his fervent zeal for the interests of the state, his noble 
equanimity, tried by both extremes of fortune, and 
never disturbed by either. 



THE ENX>. 



Pkinted bt 

Cassell & Company, Limited, La Belle Sauvasb, 

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